Multilingualization with qTranslate

• By attosoft
• Posted in WordPress
• On July 16, 2012
• No Comments.

* Created from a part of the post (Web Site Redesigned) that I wrote before.

Generally there are four methods to multilingualize web site.

1. Install to different database
2. Install to same database with different table prefix
3. Creating a network of sites by using multisite feature
4. Using qTranslate plugin

I read the following post and decided to multilingualize web site with qTranslate plugin.

• Make Your Website Multilingual Using WordPress Plugin – qTranslate | Web Creator Box

Date/Time Format

Default date/time format settings in qTranslate must be wrong. I changed them like below.

English

• Date Format: Replace %A %B %e%q, %Y with F j, Y
• Time Format: Replace %I:%M %p with g:i A

Japanese

• Date Format: Replace %Y年%m月%d日 with Y年n月j日
• Time Format: Replace %H:%M with H:i

qTranslate description says as follows, but I think this is lie. You should enter WordPress Date/Time format instead of strftime or date format. You can see WordPress format in [Dashboard] – [General Settings] – [Date Format].

Date Format

Depending on your Date / Time Conversion Mode, you can either enter a strftime (use %q for day suffix (st,nd,rd,th)) or date format. This field is optional. (Example: %A %B %e%q, %Y)

Time Format

Depending on your Date / Time Conversion Mode, you can either enter a strftime or date format. This field is optional. (Example: %I:%M %p)

Language Chooser Menu

You can use “qTranslate Language Chooser” widget in sidebar and footer. But I wanted to switch language by using custom menu. So I wrote the following code in functions.php.

function my_nav_menu_items($items) {
	// Language Chooser
	global $q_config;
	$url = is_404() ? get_option('home') : '';
	$lang = qtrans_getLanguage() == 'ja' ? 'en' : 'ja';
	return $items . "<li id='menu-item-lang' class='lang-{$lang} menu-item menu-item-type-custom menu-item-object-lang'><a href='" . qtrans_convertURL($url, $lang) . "' hreflang='{$lang}'>{$q_config['language_name'][$lang]}</a></li>";
}
add_filter('wp_nav_menu_items', 'my_nav_menu_items');

Here is a screenshot of Language Chooser Menu.

Link URL of Home Menu

Home menu in custom menu links to top page of blog (i.e. [General Settings] – [Site Address (URL)]). I appended the following code in the function above to convert the top page URL according to current language. I think there is a better way but I have no idea for now.

function my_nav_menu_items($items) {
	// Home URL
	$items = str_replace('"' . get_home_url() . '/"', '"' . qtrans_convertURL(get_home_url()) . '/"', $items);

Translate Template Files

The post I read introduces the translation code below.

<?php _e("<!--:en-->english<!--:--><!--:ja-->Japanese<!--:-->"); ?>

You can also use the simple code like below.

<?php _e("[:en]english[:ja]Japanese"); ?>

As you know, if you use __() function instead of _e() function, a value is not output but returns as return value.

Support qTranslate in Your Theme

There are useful qTranslate functions for developers. For instance, qtrans_getLanguage() function returns current language and qtrans_convertURL() function converts a URL according to current language. If you want to see more functions, visit the following page.

• qTranslate Forum – View topic – Functions for Developers and Template Authors

Of course qTranslate is required by using these functions. If you want to support environments that has no qTranslate, use function_exists function.