The WordPress project has a near-infinite number of translation projects, thanks to the inclusion of plugins and themes in translate.wordpress.org. For new locale teams, and even experienced locale teams, it can be difficult to know which projects to focus on to make the best use of your time.
This guide includes some suggested projects, which can also be aligned with your team’s size or experience.
Translation Project Overview
The translation status for most (but not all) of the primary projects listed here can be seen on https://translate.wordpress.org/stats. That’s a good page to bookmark to quickly see when new strings need attention.
In general, all teams begin by focusing on the WordPress core project to ensure that the WordPress software is available in their language. Once WordPress core is complete, you may wish to review the suggestions below to help prioritize projects for your team. As a note, Polyglots also help translate content on other WordPress.org sites, such as HelpHub pages, forum documentation, and contributor handbooks.
Setting priorities
Aside from translating the core WordPress software, it’s up to each locale team to determine what projects will best support their local communities. Having clear priorities can help new and active contributors know how best to use their time when contributing translations. Likewise, it can help translation editors to have fewer projects to review by prioritizing just a few projects that the team has decided on together.
Some ways to figure out priorities might include:
- An event in your local community, such as a weekly translation chat or even a local Meetup.
- A quarterly or yearly post on your team’s Rosetta site to brainstorm and vote on goals.
- Suggesting “global” priorities in the Make/Polyglots blog to collaborate with and encourage other locale teams.
- Through a Contributor Day at a local WordCamp.
Where to start
WordPress core
Most teams will generally focus on translating the WordPress core software to start. As of November 2022, the WordPress core project includes 9,846 strings. It’s a big project! This is why locale teams are strongly encouraged to recruit multiple translators to help divide this work.
To release a localized WordPress package, the latest WordPress core Development project needs to be translated at least 90% and Admin, at least 75%.
Translating the core WordPress software is typically the first project for locale teams to complete, as this is what makes WordPress itself accessible in your language. After translating the WordPress project, there are a handful of other projects for locale teams to consider when deciding on priorities.
Gutenberg plugin
Translating the Gutenberg (2,500 strings) plugin can also be highly helpful, as many site editing features are developed in Gutenberg before being included in the core WordPress software. As such, translating all the strings in Gutenberg can help when they are later imported into the development project for any upcoming WordPress release.
After Core
After translating the WordPress Core software, some additional, high-impact projects can benefit translation teams.
Default themes
Size: Small (81 strings)
Default themes, like Twenty Twenty Three, are released alongside each major version and typically highlight new features in the latest release. As such, it is helpful to translate these themes as close to the release as possible, so WordPress users in your locale can fully benefit from the latest updates.
Rosetta Sites
Size: Small (233 strings)
Rosetta sites are localized versions of WordPress.org and can also serve as a place to coordinate with your locale team through the blog or team page. Localizing WordPress.org for your locale can be a helpful way to increase WordPress’ presence in your language.
As a note, some of the pages in the Rosetta sites are also available for translation via the WordPress.org Meta project (1,163 strings). Teams who want to fully localize WordPress.org may wish to prioritize both of these projects.
Get Involved
Size: You decide!
It can be very helpful to create or translate a “Get Involved” page specific to your locale team. Previously, there was a Get Involved flyer that described each of the Make contributor teams. However, a handful of locale teams have published their own Get Involved pages in their local language. This is an excellent way to recruit and onboard new contributors to your translation project.
For inspiration:
- Colabora (es_ES)
- WordPress への参加・貢献 (ja)
- Get Involved (en_UK)
- Unisciti alla Community (it)
Projects for large teams
Plugins by feature or need
Once you’ve covered the basic projects above, you may want to work on the translation of WordPress themes and WordPress plugins. Some locale teams choose to translate the top plugins and themes, based on the stats shared in these two links:
- https://translate.wordpress.org/locale/en-gb/default/stats/plugins/
- https://translate.wordpress.org/locale/en-gb/default/stats/themes/
For many locale teams, a better approach may be to focus on plugins that are specifically used by your community or community members. A community member translating a plugin that she uses for her clients’ sites, for example, may make an excellent candidate for the Project Translation Editor role. Because she uses the plugin regularly, she may be more likely to check for any fuzzy or waiting strings from other contributors, too.
Ultimately, when it comes to prioritizing plugins or themes, chat with your community to decide on a process that works best for you!
As an alternative, some teams have explored translating all plugins within a specific topic or purpose, such as accessibility-related plugins. This can be a great approach if your local community wants to support a specific feature or tool (e.g. eCommerce, custom CSS, and so on) and make sure all related plugins are available in your language.
WordPress for iOS
Size: Large (3,142 strings)
The WordPress for iOS project allows you to translate the WordPress app for Apple mobile devices.
WordPress for Android
Size: Large (3,335 strings)
The WordPress for Android project allows you to translate the WordPress app for Android devices.
Patterns
Size: Large (8,094 strings)
Patterns are pre-defined block layouts that you can copy and paste into your own site to customize further. Translating patterns allows WordPress users in your language to browse patterns in the Pattern Directory.
Projects for smaller teams
WordPress Plugin Directory
Size: Medium (716 strings)
After translating the Rosetta site, it can be helpful to translate the related directories, so that other elements of WordPress.org are accessible in your language. This project allows you to translate all strings related to the WordPress Plugin Directory.
WordPress Theme Directory
Size: Small (317 strings)
Similar to the Plugin Directory, this project allows you to translate all elements of the WordPress Theme Directory.
Pattern Directory
Size: Small/Medium (466 strings)
The Pattern Directory includes block patterns, which are ready-to-use, predefined block layouts that you can use with your site. Translating the Pattern Directory can help WordPress users in your language navigate the patterns included in this directory.
Learn WordPress
Size: Medium (685 strings)
The Learn WordPress project includes all the strings on learn.wordpress.org, excluding content like workshops and lesson plans. Translating the site itself can be a great way to start a team project around launching more workshops or lesson plans in your language.
For more information on how to submit workshops and lesson plans in your language, review the Training team Handbook.
WordPress.org News posts
After translating your Rosetta site, you can help keep your local community up-to-date on the latest WordPress news by copying and translating posts that appear on WordPress.org/news. Note that the translation process for News posts happens outside translate.wordpress.org, e.g. in Google Docs or directly in the WordPress editor.
Other projects to consider
Meta projects
Meta projects refer to projects related to the WordPress.org infrastructure. This includes the Plugin and Theme directories, WordCamp sites, WordPress.org itself, and the forums. These projects are of varying sizes, but can be helpful to consider if your goal is to make WordPress.org completely available to your community.
Team site
If you have your “team” site active (such as fr.wordpress.org/team), you will want to translate the following Meta projects to localize to your language completely:
- O2 (Size: Small, 228 strings)
- P2 “Breathe” (Size: Small, 66 strings)
- WordPress.org (Size: Medium, 1,162 strings)
WordCamp
If you have a WordCamp coming up in your region, translating the WordPress.org websites is an excellent idea. The WordCamp.org project (Size: Medium, 2,363 strings) includes all the text you see when visiting a WordCamp website, such as 2020.spain.wordcamp.org. Translating this helps attendees find information, buy tickets, and navigate the site comfortably in their language.
HelpHub
HelpHub is a feature available on Rosetta sites for locale teams to translate WordPress.org support documentation into their language. While this is a much larger project than most – as it allows you to translate all the documents you see on WordPress.org/support – it can also be helpful for contributors who find it easier to translate larger bodies of text in context rather than short strings. It can also be helpful to set up a variety of collaboration tools so contributors to the HelpHub project can coordinate more easily and easily visualize their progress.
Handbook documentation
Some locales may also wish to translate documentation from other contributor teams. This Community team Tuesday Training post from Polyglots Global Mentor Naoko Takano provides an overview of how to approach this translation process and some ideas for what to translate.