Multi-language / translations #12
Description
Marcel needs to be built with multi-language websites in mind. Some things that need to be translated:
- the website's content
- strings in templates
- date formats
- what else?
Configuring languages
In marcel.config.js:
languages: ['en', 'ro'],
defaultLanguage: 'ro'Translating content
Translations of content are linked together by sharing the same file name and location in the content folder. They are distinguished by separate language suffixes.
content
- my-post.ro.md
- my-post.en.md
These two refer to the same post. The language code suffix is ignored when generating the slug.
What if one of the languages needs a different slug? It can be overriden in the post's front matter (the slug property).
Generating permalinks for content
One idea from WordPress-land is to have urls in the form:
http://mysite.com/posts/my-post
http://mysite.com/en/posts/my-post-in-english
That is, the defaultLanguage does not include the language code in the URL, while others do.
Note: It should be possible to override the permalink scheme for multi-language content.
Translating strings
This will probably require two things:
- a dictionary (keep separate files in a
languagefolder?) - a filter in the nunjucks templates
How does the filter look?
<a href='#next'>{{ "Next" | translate }}</a>If no string is found in the dictionary for the current language, the string is rendered as-is.
Links to translated content
The templates should have access to a languages object that contains an array of all available languages.
Should the post object be augmented with a translations property that holds the equivalent posts? (Full objects, so you have access to title, content, permalink etc.)