Launchpad Help > Translations > Your project > Translation sharing and suggestions

Translation sharing and suggestions

The same messages crop up in many places. For a simple example, think of how often you've seen the phrase "Save as" in many different applications.

This duplication of the same message happens across projects, within different series of the same project and between an upstream project that's translated in Launchpad and its Ubuntu packages.

There are two ways in which Launchpad can use this to reduce the amount of work needed to translate a project:

• translation suggestions: Launchpad will suggest a translation if it already has one in its database
• translation sharing: when the same English strings appear in different versions of a project, Launchpad will optionally synchronise the translations.

Translation suggestions

Whenever someone makes a translation in Launchpad it becomes part of Launchpad's global database of translated strings. At the time of writing, there are 1,619,290 English strings that have been translated in up to 320 languages in Launchpad. Check the latest numbers.

When Launchpad spots that you're about to work on an English message for which it already has one or more translations in your language, it will suggest those translations to you. You can then chose to accept one of the suggestions or create a new translation that's better suited to the project you're working with.

This is all possible because when people make translations in Launchpad they agree to license them with the flexible BSD licence.

Translation sharing

Translation sharing can happen both between different series of a project and between a project and its Ubuntu package.

Both start out the same way:

1. Launchpad finds a template with the same name in more than one series, or in the project and its Ubuntu package.
2. Next, Launchpad looks for English strings that are same across in those identically named templates.
3. Finally, Launchpad checks to see if those English strings across are translated the same way, across different versions, in any languages.

If Launchpad finds an identical translation across different versions, it will mark those translations as shared.

This means that the work of translating new versions of a project is greatly reduced: any strings that are inherited from an earlier version and already translated and will benefit from further updates to those earlier versions, unless a translation reviewer specifically chooses to diverge one or more of the translations. Likewise, translation work on that newer version will be shared with previous series.

Similarly, translations made for the Ubuntu package of a project can be shared upstream and vice versa.

How it works differs slightly, depending on whether you're sharing translations between series of a project or between a project and its Ubuntu package.

Sharing between series

Launchpad automatically enables translation sharing between the series of a project. As soon as a shared translation is changed in one series, it automatically changes in all other series that share it. You don't need to do anything to enable this type of sharing.

Translation reviewers — i.e. for most projects, that'll be members of the appropriate translation group, but for projects with an Open translations policy that's everyone — can choose to diverge a translation for a particular series. Those diverged translations are then in the Launchpad UI.

Sharing between a project and its Ubuntu package

Sharing translations between an upstream project and its Ubuntu package works in a similar way. There are some differences, though:

• you must link the relevant project series to its corresponding Ubuntu package
• upstream translations are automatically shared with the Ubuntu package, unless the Ubuntu translators specifically diverge a particular translation
• if the the upstream project uses Launchpad for translation work, a translator with the right permissions can make a translation for the Ubuntu package and have it shared with the upstream project.

Enabling sharing between a project and its package

To enable translations sharing between a project and its Ubuntu package, you need to:

• link each project series to the relevant Ubuntu package (e.g. link series 1.0 of your project to the Ubuntu package for the Natty distro-series)
• make sure there are templates with the same name for both the project and the package.

If the project is translated in Launchpad, you don't need to do anything. However, if the project is translated outside Launchpad you'll need to:

• tell Launchpad where the translation work happens: follow the Configure translations link on the project's translations overview page

• select an appropriate translations permissions policy

• import the project's translations into Launchpad: ideally using automatic imports from a Bazaar branch.

Sharing upstream project translations with the Ubuntu package

Once sharing is enabled, Launchpad will automatically copy any new translations from the upstream project to the Ubuntu package.

Ubuntu translators can diverge individual translations on the translations web pages.

Sharing Ubuntu package translations with upstream

Upstream projects can manually export Ubuntu translations for use with their project.

Launchpad can also automatically share translations made for the Ubuntu package with the upstream project. To do so, the person making the translation needs to have translation permission &mash; i.e. be a member of the appropriate translations team — for both the Ubuntu package and the project.