179 Posts
11 years ago
54
Topic
Hi Bes, I am right now reentering the SEBLOD scene to see if there is any progress happening. I left 2 years ago
because it was impossible to get any support for SEBLOD so I moved to
FLEXIcontent which has a support level many commercial products can only
dream of. Now I find still the same issue??? No support??? Appart from
some product praising ... Everybody is reaching out to get a hold on how
to set up SEBLOD and all what the poor devels get in your posts is
"SEBLOD is great, you can do so many things with it" ... unfortunately
nobody knows how (except for those spending hours figuring out things on
their own). I know there is SD and jrmo (kudos to them!) with some videos but that
covers only a tiny amount of the know how one needs to work efficiently
with SEBLOD.
I guess it would be really appreciated by all users when you could not just praise your component but actually give related answers. I read many of your posts and very rarly I could get any usful information out of them.
"You can do a lot of thing with SEBLOD on multi-language topic"
Well, so where is the tutorial/docs that explain that? I doubt one can do any sophisticated multilingual stuff with SEBLOD because nobody seems to know how, if.
"manage your translation directly in the same content"
Ok, again I doubt that because if it would be possible it would be written somewhere or at least the programmers would know and tell people.
Dont get me wrong - I know SEBLOD comes with no price tag and I think the code is great and I honestly think that SEBLOD is not that well known and rarly used ONLY because nobody knows how to utilize it. I know, developers hate documentation! This is well known fact. :)
But at least you could offer a paid support option, so people who fell for your marketing are not lost in the middle of a project.
That is why I say: Documentation is time consuming, hence expensive. Therefore I happily pay for good docs, in my case especially for a tutorial on a multilingual setup - and for others too.
cheers
I guess it would be really appreciated by all users when you could not just praise your component but actually give related answers. I read many of your posts and very rarly I could get any usful information out of them.
"You can do a lot of thing with SEBLOD on multi-language topic"
Well, so where is the tutorial/docs that explain that? I doubt one can do any sophisticated multilingual stuff with SEBLOD because nobody seems to know how, if.
"manage your translation directly in the same content"
Ok, again I doubt that because if it would be possible it would be written somewhere or at least the programmers would know and tell people.
Dont get me wrong - I know SEBLOD comes with no price tag and I think the code is great and I honestly think that SEBLOD is not that well known and rarly used ONLY because nobody knows how to utilize it. I know, developers hate documentation! This is well known fact. :)
But at least you could offer a paid support option, so people who fell for your marketing are not lost in the middle of a project.
That is why I say: Documentation is time consuming, hence expensive. Therefore I happily pay for good docs, in my case especially for a tutorial on a multilingual setup - and for others too.
cheers
11 years ago
8
Level 1
Soblod use Joomla API, so use the joomla multilanguage system with seblod, is one way to do multi language, but the are others ways.
179 Posts
11 years ago
7
Level 2
Thanks for the suggestion. I did setup many multilanguage sites with the native Joomla system. I'd say I know that pretty well, hence I also know its limitations and therefore I want to use the SEBLOD way - if there is any.
My interest lies in as you name it "but the are others ways." -> This is exactly what I am talking about. Everybody suspects that there are "other ways" but nobody seems to know how these "other ways" work. That is why I made the statement above.
cheers
My interest lies in as you name it "but the are others ways." -> This is exactly what I am talking about. Everybody suspects that there are "other ways" but nobody seems to know how these "other ways" work. That is why I made the statement above.
cheers
11 years ago
6
Level 3
Can you explain your needs,, multi-language workflow ?
179 Posts
11 years ago
5
Level 4
Thanks for asking, very much appriciated. Ok here we go - this is what I want to achieve right now in my 4 language site:
1. my custom content type (derived from the SEBLOD Article) should have 4 title fields - 1 for each language
2. my custom content type should have 4 description wysiwyg text areas - 1 for each language
3. my custom content type must contain some custom fields that are language dependend
4. my custom content type must contain some custom fields that are language independend
5. if one of the language dependend fields is empty, the default language must kick in with a hint that this content is not yet available in the chosen language
6. the fields must be displayed in the front end view according to the chosen language in the Joomla language switcher (or the URL parameter "lang")
1. my custom content type (derived from the SEBLOD Article) should have 4 title fields - 1 for each language
2. my custom content type should have 4 description wysiwyg text areas - 1 for each language
3. my custom content type must contain some custom fields that are language dependend
4. my custom content type must contain some custom fields that are language independend
5. if one of the language dependend fields is empty, the default language must kick in with a hint that this content is not yet available in the chosen language
6. the fields must be displayed in the front end view according to the chosen language in the Joomla language switcher (or the URL parameter "lang")
11 years ago
4
Level 5
One way:
1. my custom content type (derived from the SEBLOD Article) should have 4 title fields - 1 for each language.
use only 1 and use joomla native select language in article
2. my custom content type should have 4 description wysiwyg text areas - 1 for each language.
use only 1 and use joomla native select language in article
3. my custom content type must contain some custom fields that are language dependend.
make it depended of article selected language
5. if one of the language dependend fields is empty, the default language must kick in with a hint that this content is not yet available in the chosen language.
Write it in error message when search list don´t find anything.
1. my custom content type (derived from the SEBLOD Article) should have 4 title fields - 1 for each language.
use only 1 and use joomla native select language in article
2. my custom content type should have 4 description wysiwyg text areas - 1 for each language.
use only 1 and use joomla native select language in article
3. my custom content type must contain some custom fields that are language dependend.
make it depended of article selected language
5. if one of the language dependend fields is empty, the default language must kick in with a hint that this content is not yet available in the chosen language.
Write it in error message when search list don´t find anything.
179 Posts
11 years ago
3
Level 6
Thanks. But what you describe is what I achieve with the native Joomla setup, without SEBLOD. I would not post in the SEBLOD forum if I would ask for Joomla support. I want a setup with the benefits of using SEBLOD.
Here we are again - nobody seems to know ...
cheers
Here we are again - nobody seems to know ...
cheers
11 years ago
2
Level 7
If you want use your workflow exactly, use positions override to block content based in language selected
179 Posts
11 years ago
1
Level 8
Thank you very much for trying to help, but this is going nowhere near what I would like to do. From what I already figured out there need to be live value fields or something like that involved, not position overrides. I need to keep it maintainable.
cheers
cheers
11 years ago
0
Level 9
Live value in this case is only to knw the active language, but you want to show the message "this content is not yet available in the chosen language". So....
11 years ago
0
Level 1
This post, like so many others here seems to be leading nowhere.
@carin
you speak from my heart in your original post. I couldn't agree more to what you say there. And this issue has been adressed many times in this forum and in the old one, too. But still the devs refuse to produce good documentation. There were even offers from SEBLOD users to help setting up documentation. The devs don't seem to care. This is a shame, really. SEBLOD is a great extension with a lot of potential.
I know quite a few people who wanted to use it and then gave in because of the steep learning curve. Who is willing to spend hours and hours to find out how to get simple tasks done?
The Octopoos team offer paid support through their website. It is 85€/hour. Hardly anybody is willing to pay that. This is not the right way to do it. How do developers of other components organize their support? Maybe SEBLOD devs should exchange some ideas with others to finally find a way to do it right.
I got stuck on setting up multilingual site, too. And I'm a pretty experienced user for the last 3 years. Nobody seems to be able to clarify how the basic steps work.
I would like to organize multilingual content with 1 form that handles all languages. In the old forum someone told me that he did it that way. But again, he would not reveal how he accomplished it. The thread just went dead. Like this is a big secret that has to be kept. Really weird.
@Codigo Alberto
Thanks for trying to help. What do you mean exactly by "use joomla native select language in article"? Please explain.
@carin
you speak from my heart in your original post. I couldn't agree more to what you say there. And this issue has been adressed many times in this forum and in the old one, too. But still the devs refuse to produce good documentation. There were even offers from SEBLOD users to help setting up documentation. The devs don't seem to care. This is a shame, really. SEBLOD is a great extension with a lot of potential.
I know quite a few people who wanted to use it and then gave in because of the steep learning curve. Who is willing to spend hours and hours to find out how to get simple tasks done?
The Octopoos team offer paid support through their website. It is 85€/hour. Hardly anybody is willing to pay that. This is not the right way to do it. How do developers of other components organize their support? Maybe SEBLOD devs should exchange some ideas with others to finally find a way to do it right.
I got stuck on setting up multilingual site, too. And I'm a pretty experienced user for the last 3 years. Nobody seems to be able to clarify how the basic steps work.
I would like to organize multilingual content with 1 form that handles all languages. In the old forum someone told me that he did it that way. But again, he would not reveal how he accomplished it. The thread just went dead. Like this is a big secret that has to be kept. Really weird.
@Codigo Alberto
Thanks for trying to help. What do you mean exactly by "use joomla native select language in article"? Please explain.
11 years ago
0
Level 1
Hi Zwergo,
thanks for pointing me to that thread. I read it a while ago when I already knew about the multilanguage labels translation in language overrides. So it didn't really help for the part with organizing the content type.
The question for me still is how we set up a content type so we can use the same form for filling in different languages.
The native Joomla multilanguage feature requires an extra article for each language. Now if I had one form in Seblod that handles all languages, how would I do that?
I 'm sure we would need the language field in the form. Now lets assume we fill in the form in English, choose English in the language field and save. The article gets saved with unique id to the DB.
Now we open the same article and fill in the form in German, choose German in the language field and hit save. Now the English content that we previously saved would get overridden by the German content because the article still has the same unique id.
So how can we tell the system to save the German version with it's own id. And how does the system later know which article id to load if we want to edit German/English?
These are the kind of questions that I'm still not able to answer myself.
I'll drop you a mail.
Cheers
Gerhard
thanks for pointing me to that thread. I read it a while ago when I already knew about the multilanguage labels translation in language overrides. So it didn't really help for the part with organizing the content type.
The question for me still is how we set up a content type so we can use the same form for filling in different languages.
The native Joomla multilanguage feature requires an extra article for each language. Now if I had one form in Seblod that handles all languages, how would I do that?
I 'm sure we would need the language field in the form. Now lets assume we fill in the form in English, choose English in the language field and save. The article gets saved with unique id to the DB.
Now we open the same article and fill in the form in German, choose German in the language field and hit save. Now the English content that we previously saved would get overridden by the German content because the article still has the same unique id.
So how can we tell the system to save the German version with it's own id. And how does the system later know which article id to load if we want to edit German/English?
These are the kind of questions that I'm still not able to answer myself.
I'll drop you a mail.
Cheers
Gerhard
179 Posts
11 years ago
0
Level 1
"create a field desc_en"
=> that is what I am trying right now, but the tricky part for me is to display the correct field according to the current language. What works for me is a position override in mainbody.php:
$urlLang = JRequest::getVar('lang', 'en');
if($urlLang === 'en'){ echo $cck->renderField('art_introtext'); }
elseif($urlLang === 'de'){ echo $cck->renderField('introtext_german'); }
But that is not ideal. I would prefer a solution where the choice of the fields to display is made within the content type setup of SEBLOD. I guess one needs somehow to use a livevalue field ... somehow ...
One problem with that approach is that one needs to apply overrides to ALL views: catagory, search, ...
=> that is what I am trying right now, but the tricky part for me is to display the correct field according to the current language. What works for me is a position override in mainbody.php:
$urlLang = JRequest::getVar('lang', 'en');
if($urlLang === 'en'){ echo $cck->renderField('art_introtext'); }
elseif($urlLang === 'de'){ echo $cck->renderField('introtext_german'); }
But that is not ideal. I would prefer a solution where the choice of the fields to display is made within the content type setup of SEBLOD. I guess one needs somehow to use a livevalue field ... somehow ...
One problem with that approach is that one needs to apply overrides to ALL views: catagory, search, ...
11 years ago
0
Level 1
@carin,
thank you for that. This sheds some light on the situation.
Another problem that I see with your approach is that we have to add an extra input field for every language.
It would be great to know a way that allows to use one single form for handling all languages without the need of extra fields for the languages.
thank you for that. This sheds some light on the situation.
But that is not ideal. I would prefer a solution where the choice of the fields to display is made within the content type setup of SEBLOD. I guess one needs somehow to use a livevalue field ... somehow ...I don't see how we could solve this with a live value. But may someone else has an idea?
Another problem that I see with your approach is that we have to add an extra input field for every language.
It would be great to know a way that allows to use one single form for handling all languages without the need of extra fields for the languages.
175 Posts
11 years ago
0
Level 1
As far as fields go, you can use language overrides for labels, for select type values, and so on.
As for categories I use MultilanguagesCK in the form {langck=en-GB}language-dependant-category-description{/langck}, so I use 1 set of categories for all languages.
Before Seblod, I have used ZOO which have ZooLingual component, that does exactly what you are describing - 1 content type for all languages, but I was stung by one thing - no matter what language you use, you are always presented with the article title in the default language (in front editing), so that solution is not ideal if you want front editing.
If you use Seblod + Joomla! multilanguage approach, you gain another advantage - all article visit counters are separate.
In admin, you get a down arrow button to the right of the article name (at least it was there in Joomla! 3.1.x) which allowed to create a copy content in another language. To achieve the same from frontend, I had to created text fields (field is bound to article id) that linked to edit forms with Custom Variables translate=en-GB&translate_id=*value*&id=0
The final id=0 resets the id (and thus creates a new item). It's not an ideal solution, and can create various problems, but is a good place to start if your site is mostly a translation of one default language.
Also, (but I am too lazy right now to check it), if you create a different language clone of an article, I think the association is automatically created. I am certain about that in the Admin. If not, you can always use the same id trick as with language edit...
Any way, article content with all fields are maintained.
Also, in all kinds of searches, remember to set the Article language to hidden and to fix value - language.
There should be a way to have a multilanguage article and category title, that way all of this story would be trivial.
As for categories I use MultilanguagesCK in the form {langck=en-GB}language-dependant-category-description{/langck}, so I use 1 set of categories for all languages.
Before Seblod, I have used ZOO which have ZooLingual component, that does exactly what you are describing - 1 content type for all languages, but I was stung by one thing - no matter what language you use, you are always presented with the article title in the default language (in front editing), so that solution is not ideal if you want front editing.
If you use Seblod + Joomla! multilanguage approach, you gain another advantage - all article visit counters are separate.
In admin, you get a down arrow button to the right of the article name (at least it was there in Joomla! 3.1.x) which allowed to create a copy content in another language. To achieve the same from frontend, I had to created text fields (field is bound to article id) that linked to edit forms with Custom Variables translate=en-GB&translate_id=*value*&id=0
The final id=0 resets the id (and thus creates a new item). It's not an ideal solution, and can create various problems, but is a good place to start if your site is mostly a translation of one default language.
Also, (but I am too lazy right now to check it), if you create a different language clone of an article, I think the association is automatically created. I am certain about that in the Admin. If not, you can always use the same id trick as with language edit...
Any way, article content with all fields are maintained.
Also, in all kinds of searches, remember to set the Article language to hidden and to fix value - language.
There should be a way to have a multilanguage article and category title, that way all of this story would be trivial.
143 Posts
11 years ago
4
Level 1
Hi all,
This is a site in 4 languages that depending on the language of your browser will choose the language automatically.
Click on the 3rd tab of the menu: this is a Seblod 2.5 list followed by content (The site is 1,5 years old and I will update the site soon).
Setup:
4 main menus
4 categories (one for each language = copied seblod content & seach from one language to another and changed cat ID + labels)
That's all.
Bernard
This is a site in 4 languages that depending on the language of your browser will choose the language automatically.
Click on the 3rd tab of the menu: this is a Seblod 2.5 list followed by content (The site is 1,5 years old and I will update the site soon).
Setup:
4 main menus
4 categories (one for each language = copied seblod content & seach from one language to another and changed cat ID + labels)
That's all.
Bernard
179 Posts
11 years ago
3
Level 2
Thanks for the details, but that is exactly the problem: "4 categories (one for each language ...". We do NOT want that because it is a maintenance nightmare if you have many language indipendent fields in your content type. We want ALL languages in ONE SINGLE form and let the content form figure out what fields to display according to the frontend language.
Interesting ... 18 posts and not a single hint from the SEBLOD team ... dont they see that the community is struggling on the simplest setup and wrestling with their code?
Interesting ... 18 posts and not a single hint from the SEBLOD team ... dont they see that the community is struggling on the simplest setup and wrestling with their code?
143 Posts
11 years ago
2
Level 3
What do you mean by "language independent fields", Carin?
I use the same fields for all 4 categories (languages) - The only thing i did: I adapted the lables in each of the categories, that's all.
As a matter of fact, I created ONE content type and copied it 3 times. After that I fixed each one of the 3 other content types to write to another Category and adapted their lables to the appropriate language .. Simple as cheese (KISS) (example - note that here it will be in English (url) but google automatically refers the content to the appropriate language url, depending on the search engine people locally use - Try a google search for: Jos De Decker - Eva .. and hit the result pointing to beeldenindestad.be/etc - depending on your browser setting you should get it in NL, FR,DE or EN)
Same story for the Search and list types
Bernard
Edit 27/04/2014 - Now the site is running on warp 7.2 - Master template - multiplatform
I use the same fields for all 4 categories (languages) - The only thing i did: I adapted the lables in each of the categories, that's all.
As a matter of fact, I created ONE content type and copied it 3 times. After that I fixed each one of the 3 other content types to write to another Category and adapted their lables to the appropriate language .. Simple as cheese (KISS) (example - note that here it will be in English (url) but google automatically refers the content to the appropriate language url, depending on the search engine people locally use - Try a google search for: Jos De Decker - Eva .. and hit the result pointing to beeldenindestad.be/etc - depending on your browser setting you should get it in NL, FR,DE or EN)
Same story for the Search and list types
Bernard
Edit 27/04/2014 - Now the site is running on warp 7.2 - Master template - multiplatform
179 Posts
11 years ago
0
Level 4
Thanks for asking. See post no. 5 above. There I explain the expected setup, e.g. I have a registration number field which is the same for all the languages, hence I dont want to punch that in for every language again.
203 Posts
10 years ago
0
Level 4
Dear Pretobrazza, excuse me for the delay about my reply. You have said right about change label for every field in any different language but I have an ask: I have many select fields in my form. How can I translate the different values for every language within the select field ? I hope is there a solution.
Regards, Louis
376 Posts
10 years ago
4
Level 1
Hi guys,
So... yes a full multi-language tutorial is required. Like you see, we are investing on the documentation & video. It's coming.
The new version published today will help you to manage languages directly in one form (and so not duplicate all a content for each language).
The method is to add specific field for each language. Example title_en, title_fr, title_de, desc_en, desc_fr, desc_de and then to display the good field value in regards of the current language. You will be able to do this with the last version of SEBLOD and this FREE plugin http://www.seblod.com/products/10869
To do the same before this last SEBLOD version, we was using a Language Typo field. It was not the better solution that's why we have not publish this plugin. The best solution is what you have now on the last version with "Restriction" plugin.
Hope it helps.
Regards.
So... yes a full multi-language tutorial is required. Like you see, we are investing on the documentation & video. It's coming.
The new version published today will help you to manage languages directly in one form (and so not duplicate all a content for each language).
The method is to add specific field for each language. Example title_en, title_fr, title_de, desc_en, desc_fr, desc_de and then to display the good field value in regards of the current language. You will be able to do this with the last version of SEBLOD and this FREE plugin http://www.seblod.com/products/10869
To do the same before this last SEBLOD version, we was using a Language Typo field. It was not the better solution that's why we have not publish this plugin. The best solution is what you have now on the last version with "Restriction" plugin.
Hope it helps.
Regards.
178 Posts
10 years ago
3
Level 2
Hi, Bes.That sounds great, but what about article title in breadcrumbs and other small things like that? It gets article title from title field in DB. Will it get right language by using this restricrion plugin?
And what about linking between languages. I guess that it will work only on menu items level, but not in categories and articles.
Jeka
And what about linking between languages. I guess that it will work only on menu items level, but not in categories and articles.
Jeka
376 Posts
10 years ago
1
Level 3
Thanks Jeka.
About the breadcrumbs, I don't advise to display the title in the breadcrumbs because the title has always some different size and brings often some design issue, it's not useful for the visitor (the title of the article is already displayed in big), don't make a lot of sense for SEO (display exactly the same title string 2 times).
After that, yes, when you use a same content to be displayed in different language, the URL stays the same. In this case we recommend to have at least an menu item id different such as http://www.alain-milliat.com/en/the-collection/nectar-banane and http://www.alain-milliat.com/fr/la-collection/nectar-banane
or to use in the alias only the item id (you can choose this mode in SEBLOD list type).
We don't use anymore native Joomla category view in our websites but only SEBLOD list type which allow a lot more flexibility and better performance.
Regards
About the breadcrumbs, I don't advise to display the title in the breadcrumbs because the title has always some different size and brings often some design issue, it's not useful for the visitor (the title of the article is already displayed in big), don't make a lot of sense for SEO (display exactly the same title string 2 times).
After that, yes, when you use a same content to be displayed in different language, the URL stays the same. In this case we recommend to have at least an menu item id different such as http://www.alain-milliat.com/en/the-collection/nectar-banane and http://www.alain-milliat.com/fr/la-collection/nectar-banane
or to use in the alias only the item id (you can choose this mode in SEBLOD list type).
We don't use anymore native Joomla category view in our websites but only SEBLOD list type which allow a lot more flexibility and better performance.
Regards
178 Posts
10 years ago
0
Level 4
Hi. Tnks for answer.
I agree that breadcumbs don`t make a lot of sense for SEO but rich snippets make.
One more question.
Due to your recomendation, is it any way to make autocreation of menu item per content?
I remember that in jSeblod 1.8 we had field that was able to do that.
Regards
I agree that breadcumbs don`t make a lot of sense for SEO but rich snippets make.
One more question.
Due to your recomendation, is it any way to make autocreation of menu item per content?
I remember that in jSeblod 1.8 we had field that was able to do that.
Regards
10 years ago
0
Level 3
You are able to link between articles of different languages with the association plugin. This is integrated in the standard version of SEBLOD. I havent tried it with categories, but with articles it is still working.
10 years ago
0
Level 1
My personal opinion to the new joomla language plugin.
It makes translations easier because you can translate all languages in one form but.....
It makes translations easier because you can translate all languages in one form but.....
- from SEO point of view it uses always the same article in the URL - this ist very bad to SEO because search engines are looking also for the URL-path-text. F.e. if you have an English page and in the URL you have all the German words from the path it will not influence your search engine ranking in a positive way.
- You have to create all translateable fields x-times (depending on how much languages you have). This could end up in a mess if your content type is more complex (over 40 fields, groupx, fieldx,...).
- The idea of this plugin is not bad, but I would prefer to improve the article batch process, where you can copy the articles for each language. A copy button should be integrated in each form view. This seems to me the better way.
179 Posts
10 years ago
0
Level 1
I agree with Juergen and thank you Bes for the new plugin, technically that works, but as Juergen points out with major draw backs.
To summerise what still needs to be done to make that plugin usable:
1) "copying content" is actually NOT what you want! What you want is having language dependent and language independent fields in an article (just like in FLEXIcontent), because if you have e.g. a catalouge with tech specs you dont want to go through 30 fields x 10 languages to alter the same number on every article multiple times for every change that the product encounters. ... and now just imagine the frontend editing process for editors on community driven websites ...
But here I also agree - a copy button is however desperately needed!
To summerise what still needs to be done to make that plugin usable:
- SEBLOD needs to come up with a soultion for the SEO problem (meta data (Google does not use those significantly but Google is not the only search engine!), page title, article title, URL (the recommendation from Bes to have a menu item for each article is not feasible for large websites with articles organised in categories)) that comes with the "all languages in on form" approach, untill then it renders this plugin as an "alpha - not for production" version
- SEBLOD should keep both ways of translating content available for users, some need the "all languages in one form" approach, some need Juergens way with copying content 1) and hence sticking to the native Joomla multilingual approach
1) "copying content" is actually NOT what you want! What you want is having language dependent and language independent fields in an article (just like in FLEXIcontent), because if you have e.g. a catalouge with tech specs you dont want to go through 30 fields x 10 languages to alter the same number on every article multiple times for every change that the product encounters. ... and now just imagine the frontend editing process for editors on community driven websites ...
But here I also agree - a copy button is however desperately needed!
10 years ago
3
Level 1
Has anyone considered using Falang? This is my favourite method for websites which have identical content in several languages. where the content differs per language then the joomla method is used. Falang is based on the old Joomfish component and is very reliable. All it needs is an xml file with the fields to be translated per component.
179 Posts
10 years ago
2
Level 2
Thank you for contributing. Please read trough the thread and you will understand why Falang is no option here, thanks.
10 years ago
0
Level 3
Thanks for the slapped wrist - I did read it but I guess the discussion is too technical for me. I am very interested in the result as I'm in the process of building a site which will have to have anything up to 20 languages in it.
10 years ago
0
Level 3
Falang is really useful and fixes Joomla's native language system. I've been working on a site with 9 languages and it was hell. Luckyly falang exists, otherwise I would have reconsidered using Joomla...
So.. What would be really nice is a plugin or core feature that would synchronize with falang:
- Automatically create/update content xml when saving content types (for articles and categories it should keep a backup of the originals).
- In the form flag icons or dropdown to switch between languages, only for fields that can be translated (could be a layer in javascript). By using falang, it would unnecessary to create fields with language codes (such as "fieldname_en"), everything in the form represent the default language.
- When saving a content item (aka an article..), it should also create/update the falang translation table (#__falang_content). The "alias" field would have to be generated too from the "title", if not specified. That will make the URL translated.
***********
This brings me to a next post subject.. Seblod allows to store most of the content outside the #__content table. I think there should be a way to detach completely from articles and stick only to independents tables. Even the Seblod modules are recommended over the Joomla article modules for performance and so on. Also it causes problems like duplication, confusing articles management, etc... I think that it should be possible to have a separate section to create content type instances without creating a single article.
What do you think ?
So.. What would be really nice is a plugin or core feature that would synchronize with falang:
- Automatically create/update content xml when saving content types (for articles and categories it should keep a backup of the originals).
- In the form flag icons or dropdown to switch between languages, only for fields that can be translated (could be a layer in javascript). By using falang, it would unnecessary to create fields with language codes (such as "fieldname_en"), everything in the form represent the default language.
- When saving a content item (aka an article..), it should also create/update the falang translation table (#__falang_content). The "alias" field would have to be generated too from the "title", if not specified. That will make the URL translated.
***********
This brings me to a next post subject.. Seblod allows to store most of the content outside the #__content table. I think there should be a way to detach completely from articles and stick only to independents tables. Even the Seblod modules are recommended over the Joomla article modules for performance and so on. Also it causes problems like duplication, confusing articles management, etc... I think that it should be possible to have a separate section to create content type instances without creating a single article.
What do you think ?
10 years ago
0
Level 1
At the moment standard Joomla multilingual system is the only one which works fine and bullet proof. I have made a site with German and English and it works fine.
There is a batch-plugin for articles available in the forum. With this plugin you are able to copy articles made with SEBLOD and you are able to make a copy f.e. of the German article and then you can translate it into English.
My recommendation:
At the moment make only multilingual sites if it is really necessary and not for other reasons.
Some customers have only clients in the same country but they want a multilingual site because it is stylish. Try to convince them that it will cost much more, is much more work for them to keep all sites up to date in all languages and it will never lead to more conversions rates (income).
And of course you will have less headache due the problems that maybe occur by creating a multilingual site. :-)
Multilingual in SEBLOD is still under developement and not really handy.
There is a batch-plugin for articles available in the forum. With this plugin you are able to copy articles made with SEBLOD and you are able to make a copy f.e. of the German article and then you can translate it into English.
My recommendation:
At the moment make only multilingual sites if it is really necessary and not for other reasons.
Some customers have only clients in the same country but they want a multilingual site because it is stylish. Try to convince them that it will cost much more, is much more work for them to keep all sites up to date in all languages and it will never lead to more conversions rates (income).
And of course you will have less headache due the problems that maybe occur by creating a multilingual site. :-)
Multilingual in SEBLOD is still under developement and not really handy.
10 years ago
0
Level 1
Hy guys,
with the new implemented translation workflow it is quite easy to translate articles.
It works like described on this page. The only thing you have to do is to add the article association field to your content type.
First make an article in your own language and store it. After that pick up the article from the article overview in the backend. Next to the title you will find the dropdown with the translation workflow. Choose the language you wanna make the translation.
Seblod now copies the article and put the language to f.e. en-GB. Manually you have to select also the category in this language. Now start to translate all the fields like in Joomfish.
Ready!
Ive done this for several articles and it works like a charm. It uses the standard Joomla language component so there are no problems.
Best regards Jürgen
with the new implemented translation workflow it is quite easy to translate articles.
It works like described on this page. The only thing you have to do is to add the article association field to your content type.
First make an article in your own language and store it. After that pick up the article from the article overview in the backend. Next to the title you will find the dropdown with the translation workflow. Choose the language you wanna make the translation.
Seblod now copies the article and put the language to f.e. en-GB. Manually you have to select also the category in this language. Now start to translate all the fields like in Joomfish.
Ready!
Ive done this for several articles and it works like a charm. It uses the standard Joomla language component so there are no problems.
Best regards Jürgen
10 years ago
4
Level 1
The new language workflow since v3.1 is a big improvement.
@carin
I wouldn't go for the plugin mentioned by Bes that hides fields based on language. For the reasons that Jürgen mentioned above.
I agree that it would be nice to have language dependent and independent fields in one form to make administration of multilingual sites easier. Unfortunately this seems not to be possible in a Joomla/Seblod environment due to the way that Joomla natively handles multiple languages.
You might want to take a look at ProcessWire CMS (even if some people might hate me for posting this link). It has exactly the setup for handling multilanguage pages that you require. I just setup a multilingual site with it and is was a breeze and is very easy to maintain.
@carin
I wouldn't go for the plugin mentioned by Bes that hides fields based on language. For the reasons that Jürgen mentioned above.
I agree that it would be nice to have language dependent and independent fields in one form to make administration of multilingual sites easier. Unfortunately this seems not to be possible in a Joomla/Seblod environment due to the way that Joomla natively handles multiple languages.
You might want to take a look at ProcessWire CMS (even if some people might hate me for posting this link). It has exactly the setup for handling multilanguage pages that you require. I just setup a multilingual site with it and is was a breeze and is very easy to maintain.
179 Posts
10 years ago
3
Level 2
"I agree that it would be nice to have language dependent and independent
fields in one form to make administration of multilingual sites easier.
Unfortunately this seems not to be possible in a Joomla/Seblod
environment due to the way that Joomla natively handles multiple
languages."
It is possible, FLEXIcontent does it since ages. Jürgens/Joomlas way is a maintenance nightmare if you have 5 languages and 30 language independent fields.
It is possible, FLEXIcontent does it since ages. Jürgens/Joomlas way is a maintenance nightmare if you have 5 languages and 30 language independent fields.
10 years ago
2
Level 3
Flexicontent state on their website:
Please correct me if I'm wrong here. I haven't worked yet with Flexi. You seem to have.
FLEXIcontent is primarily an advanced content management system developed to replace the native article manager of Joomla! 1.5 2.5 and now 3.2That means, that they are not using the native com_content to organize content. They are replacing it with their own system. That might be the reason why they can handle multilingual content differently from native Joomla functionality.
Please correct me if I'm wrong here. I haven't worked yet with Flexi. You seem to have.
179 Posts
10 years ago
1
Level 4
FC uses com_content, they only extend it. With that you dont lose any of your articles main content when you swtich back to Joomla without FC. But that would be rarly the case anyway. The main advantage of FC (and SEBLOD I think) over Yootheme with Zoo (the wasp of the Joomla universe that needs be kicked out) and K2 and so on is, that you can use native Joomal modules like slideshows etc. to display the main content of your articles.
... ok, that was a bit off topic though. That only should confirm that language dependent and independent fields are possible to do in Joomla.
... ok, that was a bit off topic though. That only should confirm that language dependent and independent fields are possible to do in Joomla.
10 years ago
0
Level 5
thanks for the explanation!
10 years ago
0
Level 2
Your post just put a big smile on my face :-)
10 years ago
0
Level 1
PW sounds very interesting, but only if you are setting up a site for a small bakery in the neighbourhood, but not for more complex sites. There are to less possibilites - but for small non complex sites its ok.
The workflow for creating content is quite easy for customers.
The workflow for creating content is quite easy for customers.
10 years ago
0
Level 1
I am the same opinion with zwergo. Processwire is, and this makes my heart bleeding as a Joomla and Seblod fan, much more better than Joomla with all its components. Translating is as it should be for customers - easier as easy! You dont need to create for each language an extra page - you could translate it in one page with tabs. And for all creators: it is stable.
And for all Seblod fans: you can do the same as in Seblod and much more.
The best: you can define fields as multilingual or not - for example: you have a field called "price of a product" - you can set it to all languges so you have to enter it only one time and it will be visible in all langues.
I recommend all to try out this amazing CMS because this is a real CMS.
And for all Seblod fans: you can do the same as in Seblod and much more.
The best: you can define fields as multilingual or not - for example: you have a field called "price of a product" - you can set it to all languges so you have to enter it only one time and it will be visible in all langues.
I recommend all to try out this amazing CMS because this is a real CMS.
10 years ago
2
Level 1
To many messages, and each one have your own workflow for multilanguage system, that´s why is very dificult to satisfy all
179 Posts
10 years ago
1
Level 2
... not "each one". There are basically 3 useful different ways to do a multilingual site:
- the "all languages in on form" approach, filtering the fields in the front end via the "restriction" field
- the native Joomla multilingual approach in conjuction with language in/dependent fields (like FLEXIcontent allows it already)
- Falang
10 years ago
0
Level 3
3 .Falang approach will be very dificcult, since it´s necessary that seblod create xml files onfly. Seblod it´s a very flexible system.
376 Posts
10 years ago
6
Level 1
Thanks everybody.
So yes Process Wire still a baby in comparaison of SEBLOD... And I don't speak about performance such as https://processwire.com/talk/topic/4442-pw-performance-with-hundreds-of-fields/ and about storage capacity.
So to be concrete about the multi-languages with SEBLOD you can:
- "all languages in one form" approach with for example a tab for each language, filtering the fields in the front end via the "restriction" field. This solution is very flexible and allow to decide if a field is "common" so for any language or if the field is specific to a language. Example a field of a predefined list of value such as a dropdown field is not useful to be translate (only one field is enough and translated value with JText).
- native Joomla multilingual approach: one content per language with the use or not of "association" links
Clearly you can build your own translation system with SEBLOD!
Thanks.
10 years ago
0
Level 2
I've been working on a plugin to use as a falang translation wrapper:
http://www.seblod.com/community/forums/fields-plug-ins/plugin-idea-for-translation-using-falang#post14273
I'm about to package it and make it available once it is enough bug free.
I'll keep posting.
179 Posts
10 years ago
4
Level 2
Hi Bes,
the "all languages in one form" solution is missing one important feature to be useful: language fallback
A "language fallback" must display the content of the default language for a field in case the language specific field is missing the language specific content.
178 Posts
10 years ago
3
Level 3
Hi.
I think you can implement language fallback by conditional statement or more easily in custom template by check if field of current language is empty, so show default language
179 Posts
10 years ago
2
Level 4
Thanks, but AFAIK conditional statements are only available in edit forms. Right, maybe a variation is the solution, but surly a core functionality would be way cleaner.
178 Posts
10 years ago
1
Level 5
You are right, but in this topic http://www.seblod.com/community/forums/fields-plug-ins/conditional-state-in-content-view#topic-3937 Bes says that conditional statements for view are planed.
179 Posts
10 years ago
0
Level 6
... yes, that was 11 months ago ... so I would not rely on that statement to see that integration happen soon
376 Posts
10 years ago
0
Level 1
Hi,
Yes language fallback is not implemented natively into SEBLOD. We're working a new version of the language restriction plugin.
Like Jeka advise it, you can easily manage this feature directly in your template or variation (better) or in a typo plugin.
Thanks.
10 years ago
2
Level 1
Hi Bes,
during JoomlaDay 2014 in Paris, it was mentioned that SEBLOD enabled setting up a multi-language site with different domain names, such as mycompany.org/, masociete.org/, MeinGmbh.org/, which is superior for SEO to the standard Joomla setup (com.org/en, com.org/fr, com.org/de, ...).
Is there a tutorial/guide on how to proceed ?
I understand that Octopoos have done it, so you know what works well and does not...
Kind regards
StephanS
376 Posts
10 years ago
1
Level 2
Hi Stephan,
Thanks for your post!
I answered you in the other post.
You need to assign each "language" site to the right language in the site configuration panel. Example mysite.fr need to be assigned to FR language. Then a content item assigned to the language "FR" and to the access view "mysite.fr" will be displayed only on mysite.fr.
Thanks.
10 years ago
0
Level 3
This is extra cool Bes !
THX :))
