grafana/contribute/internationalization.md

Internationalization

Grafana uses the i18next framework for managing translating phrases in the Grafana frontend.

tl;dr

Please note: We do not currently accept contributions for translations. Please do not submit pull requests translating grafana.json files - they will be rejected. We do accept contributions to mark up phrases for translation.

• Use <Trans i18nKey="search-results.panel-link">Go to {{ pageTitle }}</Trans> in code to add a translatable phrase
• Translations are stored in JSON files in public/locales/{locale}/grafana.json
• If a particular phrase is not available in the a language then it will fall back to English
• To update phrases in English, edit the default phrase in the component's source, then run yarn i18n:extract. Do not edit the en-ES/grafana.json or update the english phrase in Crowdin
• To update phrases in any translated language, edit the phrase in Crowdin. Do not edit the {locale}/grafana.json

How to add a new translation phrase

JSX

1. For JSX children, use the <Trans /> component from app/core/internationalization with the i18nKey, ensuring it conforms to the guidelines below, with the default english translation. e.g.

import { Trans } from 'app/core/internationalization';

const SearchTitle = ({ term }) => (
  <Trans i18nKey="search-page.results-title">
    Results for <em>{{ term }}</em>
  </Trans>
);

Prefer using <Trans /> for JSX children, and t() for props and other javascript usage.

When translating in grafana-ui, use a relative path to import <Trans /> and t() from src/utils/i18n.

Note that our tooling must be able to statically analyse the code to extract the phrase, so the i18nKey can not be dynamic. e.g. the following will not work:

const ErrorMessage = ({ id, message }) => <Trans i18nKey={`errors.${id}`}>There was an error: {{ message }}</Trans>;

2. Upon reload, the default English phrase will appear on the page.

3. Before submitting your PR, run the yarn i18n:extract command to extract the messages you added into the grafana.json file and make them available for translation.

Plain JS usage

Sometimes you may need to translate a string cannot be represented in JSX, such as placeholder props. Use the t macro for this.

import { t } from "app/core/internationalization"

const placeholder = t('form.username-placeholder','Username');

return <input type="value" placeholder={placeholder}>

Interpolating phrases is a bit more verbose. Make sure the placeholders in the string match the values passed in the object - there's no type safety here!

const placeholder = t('page.greeting', 'Hello {{ username }}', { username });

While the t function can technically be used outside of React functions (e.g, in actions/reducers), aim to keep all UI phrases within the React UI functions.

How to add a new language

1. Add new locale in Crowdin and sync files to repo
   1. Grafana OSS Crowdin project -> "dot dot dot" menu in top right -> Target languages
   2. Grafana OSS Crowdin project -> Integrations -> Github -> Sync Now
   3. If Crowdin's locale code is different from our IETF language tag, add a custom mapping in Project Settings -> Language mapping
2. Update public/app/core/internationalization/constants.ts (add new constant, and add to LOCALES)
3. Update public/locales/i18next-parser.config.js to add the new locale to locales
4. Run yarn i18n:extract and commit the result

How translations work in Grafana

Grafana uses the i18next framework for managing translating phrases in the Grafana frontend. It:

• Marks up phrases within our code for extraction
• Extracts phrases into messages catalogues for translating in external systems
• Manages the user's locale and putting the translated phrases in the UI

English phrases remain in our Javascript bundle in the source components (as the <Trans /> or t() default phrase). At runtime, we don't need to load any messages for en-US. If the user's language preference is set to another language, Grafana will load that translations's messages JSON before the initial render.

Phrase ID naming convention

We set explicit IDs for phrases to make it easier to identify phrases out of context, and to track where they're used. IDs follow a naming scheme that includes where the phrase is used. The exception is the rare case of single reoccuring words like "Cancel", but default to using a feature/phrase specific phrase.

Message IDs are made of up to three segments in the format feature.area.phrase. For example:

• dashboard.header.refresh-label
• explore.toolbar.share-tooltip

For components used all over the site, use just two segments:

• footer.update
• navigation.home

I18next context

We rely on a global i18next singleton (that lives inside the i18next) for storing the i18next config/context.

Examples

See i18next and react-i18next documentation for more details.

Basic usage

For fixed phrases:

import { Trans } from 'app/core/internationalization';

<Trans i18nKey="page.greeting">Hello user!</Trans>;

To interpolate variables, include it as an object child. It's weird syntax, but Trans will do it's magic to make it work:

import { Trans } from 'app/core/internationalization';

<Trans i18nKey="page.greeting">Hello {{ name: user.name }}!</Trans>;

const userName = user.name;
<Trans i18nKey="page.greeting">Hello {{ userName }}!</Trans>;

Variables must be strings (or, must support calling .toString(), which we almost never want).

import { Trans } from 'app/core/internationalization';

// This will not work
const userName = <strong>user.name</strong>;
<Trans i18nKey="page.greeting">Hello {{ userName }}!</Trans>;

// Instead, put the JSX inside the phrase directly
const userName = user.name;
<Trans i18nKey="page.greeting">
  Hello <strong>{{ userName }}</strong>!
</Trans>;

React components and HTML tags

Both HTML tags and React components can be included in a phase. The Trans function will handle interpolating it's children properly

import { Trans } from "app/core/internationalization"

<Trans i18nKey="page.explainer">
  Click <button>here</button> to <a href="https://grafana.com">learn more.</a>
</Trans>

// ↓ is in the grafana.json file like ↓
{
  "page": {
    "explainer": "Click <0>here</0> to <1>learn more</1>"
  }
}

Plurals

Plurals require special handling to make sure they can be translating according to the rules of each locale (which may be more complex that you think!). Use the <Trans /> component, with the count prop.

import { Trans } from 'app/core/internationalization';

<Trans i18nKey="newMessages" count={messages.length}>
  You got {{ count: messages.length }} messages.
</Trans>;

Once extracted with yarn i18n:extract you will need to manually fill in the grafana.json message catalogues with the additional plural forms. See the react-i18next docs for more details.

Documentation

Grafana's documentation is not yet open for translation and should be authored in American English only.