What do I need to do to start using an additional language?

Want to offer your booking environment in an additional language, for example French, Italian or Spanish? Then just switching on the language is not enough. Everything you entered yourself, such as products, texts, emails and pages, has to be translated or recreated for each language.

Tip: download this checklist as a PDF using the link at the top of this page, so you can tick off what you have already done.

How do you use this checklist?

Go through the items below one by one and ask yourself two questions each time:

1. Do I use this item? No? Skip it.
2. Yes? Then there are two possibilities:
   • You see a translation icon next to a field. Fill in the translation for each new language.
   • There is no translation field, as with menus, email templates and Search & Book. Create a new configuration or copy for the new language.

Tip: temporarily switch language

• New admin layout: add &lang=xx to the URL and press Enter (e.g. &lang=fr).
• Old admin layout: click the language flag in the footer.

You need this for fields that have their own value per language, such as select fields for product characteristics.

Do you have multiple licences? Then go through the steps per licence, except for the one-time steps in step 1.

1. Preparation (one-time)

• Activate the languages for the frontend and the backend. This applies to all licences at once.
• Add language files (ini files) for each new language and adjust them where needed.

2. Products

• Main and sub products: fill in all fields with a translation icon, such as name, description, product characteristics and options.
• Select fields for product characteristics: choose the correct value per language. Use the language switch from the tip for this.
• Labels of object fields: these are the descriptions in the Product characteristics block.

3. Activities (event based mode)

• For existing activities/events, fill in all translation fields, such as title, description and any extra texts.
• Pay attention to recurring activities and templates. Translate them before you create new events, so new events get the translation straight away.

4. Packages (combis and shopping cart)

• Packages (combis): fill in all fields with a translation icon, such as name, description and options.
• Shopping cart block: fill in the HTML code of the block for each language. If you leave it empty for a language, the 'Add to cart' blocks will not appear in that language.
• Shopping cart options: translate the options that are set at shopping cart level.

5. Templates

• Template sections: create a copy of each section for every new language and translate the text. Also adjust the if/else/elseif conditions.
• Email and PDF templates: create a copy for every new language.
  • Keep the template name exactly the same as for the existing languages.
  • Translate the content.
  • In {BLOCK:xx}, refer to the block or section number of the new language.

6. Website content

• Content pages: add the translation per language and adjust internal links to the correct language version.
• Content blocks: same as above.
• Pages with fixed (hardcoded) text, such as an index page, a landing page with a calendar or mod=viewobject: translate them and adjust the links.

7. SEO links (Admin → Pages)

• Add the same SEO links (aliases) for each new language.
• Link each new alias to the corresponding alias in the other languages.
• Also extend the existing aliases with a link to the new language.

8. Navigation

• Add a (main) menu for each new language.

9. Search & Book

• Create a copy of each Search & Book configuration for every new language, translate the fixed texts and adjust the links.

10. Gift vouchers and punch cards

• Translate the configured gift vouchers and punch cards.
• Also translate their overview and detail pages.

11. Customer form

• Translate the fields customers see, per language, if the default translation does not fit.

12. Payment settings

• Fill in the translation fields in the payment settings.

13. Custom tables

• For each custom table, fill in the translation fields for the new language (e.g. a table with country codes).

Check afterwards

• Switch the website to the new language and go through a complete booking, from product to confirmation email and PDF.
• Look out for links that still point to another language, and for empty texts.

Rather outsource it?

This is quite a lot of work. We can do it (partly) for you: see the Teqa service menu.

Related

• Language settings
• Template sections
• Templates (email and PDF)
• How do I create a content page in another language?
• Can I set an alias per language?
• Menus