Yet Another Rails Translation System

The forthcoming Rails 1.2 addresses the multi-byte text part of the i18n problem, but not the translation part. I've been looking for a nice simple way to do things, but haven't found anything which feels quite right so far.

Inspired by Thomas Fuchs' minimalist translation script ( mir.aculo.us JavaScript with Thomas Fuchs » Blog Archive » Ruby on Rails i18n revisited ), I've created yet another translation system.

This differs from the gettext _() approach:

* Unobtrusive format in templates: ``To translate'' rather than <%= _('To translate') %>

* The string lookup is done once per template at compile time for a more efficient system: no repeated lookups on every request.

* The translated bits can contain code, like ``To translate with a <%= number %> of items'' so order of the inserts can be modified.

* You can refer to text by a symbol so translations aren't lost when you make minor changes to the text. ``:symbol The text to translate''

More details, the code, and a sample app, here:

   http://www.fluffy.co.uk/rails-translation/

I would appreciate comments on this approach before I start using it in my app!

Thanks,

Ben

Dear Ben,

My name is Jan and I am CEO of Beluga Linguistics, a Web 2.0 language service provider. We have been involved in the management of dynamic website content for about 3 years now (clients e.g. www.last.fm, www.xing.com).

Essential for regular multilingual updates of database driven websites are fluent workflows between IT development and localization teams (managers, translators, proofreaders).

In order to meet those needs we have recently started an open source translation tool project called FIT (Found-In-Translation) which is to be built on the Ruby framework. Our goal is to create kind of standard management and working tool which enables rapid i18n processes for webservices.

Please feel free to meet the team (i18n IT developers, linguists, i18n process managers, web designers, etc.) in our group:

http://groups.google.com/group/fit_project/

Here you will find more details about the project and the tools specifications.

Your input is highly welcomed. Best regards,

Jan Hinrichs www.belugalinguistics.com