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news-catalyst / google-app-scripts

a collection of scripts for tinynews google docs add-ons
https://script.google.com/a/newscatalyst.org/d/1ILURq69o3cYUy6k1n1X6HwxdMfl9xWNhILYuZxgLfeblb3IR15WCMZSj/edit
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Managing tags on multilingual sites is complicated #363

Closed TylerFisher closed 2 years ago

TylerFisher commented 2 years ago

Currently, every tag you create in the initial language will show up as "BUG Unknown Title" in the other language. I suppose you can go in and manage every tag via the TinyCMS, but that seems overly complicated. I don't have a great idea on how to make this all doable in the sidebar, but I think the way it is presented now will cause some issues.

jacqui commented 2 years ago

Gah, well for sure we don't want to display "BUG Unknown Title"!

This gets to a foundational question I've always encountered when doing multilingual sites: should the site fallback to another language, usually English, when a translation is missing? Or should the site hide the content if the translation is missing? Or (IMO) worse option: should the site break or somehow not work without the translation?

In the past I've used things like "NEEDS TRANSLATION" while developing a site/app/story so it was obvious what needed to be addressed.

How does this approach sound? (Note: I think we should ask the creators/editors for their opinion on this, just my 2 cents)

  1. For the Google Docs sidebar, fallback to English on the tag title
  2. For the front-end site, I suggest using "needs translation" where it is lacking until official launch. Note for big content pieces like an entire article that wouldn't show up (it would 404 if not available in the locale) - this is for smaller items like tag titles.
  3. After launch, I think multilingual sites should fall back to English where a translation is missing.
TylerFisher commented 2 years ago

I agree on this approach, I'm just curious how we know to stop displaying "needs translation"