MLP: The Multilingual Publishing Pack.

The MLP Pack turns TxP 4.0.4 into multi-language ready platform for websites.

About The MLP Pack

Whilst the Pack’s predecessor (gbp_l10n v0.5) was a plugin solution, the MLP Pack is not a pure plugin.

It is too big to fit into the plugin size limit. It could have been split into multiple component plugins but instead we split it into several component files plus a plugin.

The Pack uses an altered version of the file txplib_db.php to store and serve localised content to textpattern and other plugins that use the DB layer instead of going direct to the underlying tables.

Links

You can browse a tri-lingual MLP site at http://mlp-demo.netcarving.com

Here is a flash movie showing the admin interface of the Pack.

You can read about Writing MLP-Ready Plugins here.

Admin Features

• Each TxP user can choose their own admin language — and switch between admin languages at will.
• Localisation of plugin strings via the admin interface (at last, no editing of source files!)
• Ability to search for, and edit, any TxP language string by name or by content — in any of the languages supported by the site.
• Ability to quickly locate strings with missing renditions in any language.
• Support for ‘snippets’ to simplify page/form editing and writing or for localisation of tag attributes.
• String editor can operate in RTL or LTR mode (JS to toggle between the two.)
• Write tab now allows title/body/excerpt and preview in RTL as well as LTR mode.
• Import/export of your plugin strings or snippets so you can upload to live sites or share with others.
• Export of TxP strings using the TxP language file format for distribution to other/devs.
• Export of the MLP Pack strings in its own file format for you to bundle into your client’s MLP distribution.
• Support for articles as groups of renditions.
• Support for cloning of renditions and their translation into other languages using the existing write tab.
• Email notifications sent to translators when articles are cloned or have their author changed.
• Extra filtering of the list of renditions by language.
• No hijacking of existing fields (sections/categories/custom fields) to store language information, so you are free to use the all existing fields as you need to.
• Full localisation of the following fields…
  • Category titles
  • Section titles
  • Image alt text and captions
  • Link descriptions
  • File descriptions
• Setup and Cleanup wizards.

Public Features

• Detection of the language the user wants to view a site in via the url or browser headers.
• URLs re-written so that browser caches know the difference between the renditions of articles in different languages.
• Automatic selection of the correct renditions of snippets in pages and forms.
• Fully functional search/commenting/feeds for each language the site supports.
• Feeds are also adjusted for RTL languages.
• Localised categories, sections, file & link descriptions, image alt text & captions.
• 404 support for finding renditions that are not available in the requested language.
• A tag to list all available renditions of a given article and allow switching between them.
• Tags for accessing language codes and direction information.
• Conditional tag for testing the visitors’ browse languages or the directionality of the languages.

Downloads

Versions 0.6 (and up) are available here…

• mlp-0.7.650.zip [164.61KB]
  
  • Now includes a compressed l10n.txt plugin.
  • Adds a 'clone by rendition ID' form to top of the articles table. (You will need to go to the MLP Preferences page to turn this feature on.)
    You can then type a rendition number into the form to start the cloning process without having to navigate to the correct article in the articles table.
    Thanks go to Ultramega from the Txp Forum for suggesting this feature.
  • Can now limit string searches to those strings that are available on the public interface. This can save you some trouble when using the search feature to locate strings that you want to include as snippets in your forms, only to find that they cannot be rendered because the string you chose was an admin-only one.
  : 602 download(s)
  
  
• l10n.0.7.636.compressed.txt [28.16KB]
  Here's the compressed version of the l10n.txt plugin (v0.7.636) for anyone who's having trouble installing the uncompressed one from the zip file). : 311 download(s)
  
  
• mlp-0.7.636.zip [182.49KB]
  * l10n_lang_list now supports localised category and author lists.
  * Updates to the setup wizard improve reporting of MySQL incompatibilities and allow the user a chance to skip the privilege checking.
  * Admin interface language select drop-down is now sorted by language code so entries don't "jump about" in the list.
  * The admin side language select drop-down is now also repeated in the footer -- so that any mods you make to your txplib_head.php file doesn't render this feature unusable.
  * The snippet editor now retains html encoded characters across edits.
  : 141 download(s)
  
  
• mlp-0.7.627.zip [180.04KB]
  Development snapshot
  
  Should fix previous incompatabilities with PHP5 installations.
  
  This now requires MySQL 4.1 or better.
  
  Fixes...
  * File download corruption problem
  * Blank write tab
  * Renditions tab has 'missing ID:' messages when showing high detail
  * Admin side language switcher only showing the default language
  * Missing translation fields for some plugin strings
  * Missing fields for sections
  * Translations for category strings not showing once entered
  : 142 download(s)
  
  

Credits

• Marios Buttner for his initial ideas, support, feedback, testing and translation.
• Graeme Porteous for the gbp_l10n plugin, the gbp_admin_library and help in the first few months of development.
• Destry Wion for pledging support early on.
• Team Textpattern for, ergh, Textpattern.

The ransom was completed on Feb 3rd, 2007.

Many thanks to the following donors…

• NeMe
• “Jakob”
• “woof”
• Luke Chambers of Flickerbox
• Jelle van der Heijde
• Christian Nolle
• “sbonzix”

If you want to donate for the MLP Pack you can use this link…