W.I.P.
Guide to OFBiz-i18n, Internationalisation of OFBiz
Looking around the WIKI there are few hints (and even less concrete guides) towards what needs to be done in order to add more locales to an OFBiz setup, namely the current release or SVN trunk.
Most generally, there are three areas of concern when starting a translation of OFBiz into a different locale, i.e. a language and possibly a specific sub-locale:
- Translation of Application labels
- Translation of OFBiz assets with built-in i18n options (Catalog, Product)
- Translation of Text Elements (DataResources) using CMS
However, i18n goes even beyond that as there is a clear (natural) preference for US standards-based demo data, e.g. in the area of PaymentGateways, ShippingInterfaces and Accounting in general (tax allocation, general ledger configuration). Hence a fourth section tries to address these areas:
- Re-configuration of General Ledger
- Tax configuration
- Extension of GeoData
Note that this document focusses on the CONFIGURATION of OFBiz Entities in order to display Text in a different Locale and possibly pay attention to different Legislation & Taxing in other Locales. This document does NOT aim to talk about technical localisation (Tech Folks, make sure you start at Adrian's Internationalization) or adding more local payment or shipping gateways, as t his is considered regular customisation.
A final section covers tools that can be used for the translations tasks and documents present in this wiki which refer to translations.
Translation of Application labels
The labels for the OFBiz GUI applications are the most evident part to change for an i18n project. They are part of the release and serve the purpose of 'resource packs' known from claqssic Java development.
Also refer to Tips for UI labels translation.
Location of config files
located in the configuration subdirectories as follows:OFBIZ_HOME/applications/<appname>/config
OFBIZ_HOME/framework/<appname>/config
OFBIZ_HOME/specialpurpose/<appname>/config
The naming convention is <appname>UiLabels.xml.
Most likely there will also be <appname>HelpUiLabels.xml, <appname>EntityLabels.xml and possibly other files there. Just check through an see what merits your translation.
Activation
The activation of changed configuration files is easy: Restart the OFBiz application. These configuration files are read in every time the OFBiz application container starts. Hence: Edit > Save > Restart > Use is the activation sequence.
References to other Wiki Documents
Interested to understand how you make references to the i18n labels in code? Then read this: Text Translation.
Translation of OFBiz assets with built-in i18n options
This section assumes you have understood the relationship of Content, ContentAssociations and DataResources. Also, you should understand how a DataResource can be provided to the system.
Some OFBiz entities have built-in i18n options, the most prominent (and evident) are Catalog-Categories and Product. Check out how to translate Products or Categories Name and Descriptions, have a look at How to localize Product and Categories descriptions.
You can find out which entities provide this option when searching for "*Content" in the entitymodel.xml configuration files (which will then list out all occurencies of a <entityname>Content entity). Search in the current trunk (rev 811440) resulted in the following Content-Entities:
- applications / order --> OrderContent
- applications / party --> PartyContent
- applications / party --> CommunicationsEventContent
- applications / product --> ProductCategoryContent
- applications / product --> ProductConfigurationItemContent
- applications / product --> ProductContent
- applications / workeffort --> WorkEffortContent
Most typically, the entity.name, entity.description and entity.longdescription attributes can be internationalized. A table listing the i18n options of respective entity attributes will be worked in here soon.
Be Careful
When using i18n on these entities, the "direct" attributes must be empty, otherwise the CMS lookup will not occur.
Naming Conventions for ContentId and DataSourceId
Each of your Content and DataSource items will need a unique ID, so make up your mind about naming conventions for the ContentId and DatasourceId that are related to your entities!
ProductContent special remarks
The ProductContent entity will be the most interesting one for ecommerces since working on the product descriptions will be the most of an online editor's work. Also customizing text for different locales when you run a multi-locale shop will be a huge task. Best results are achieved when an XML template is used that defines all relevant entities for a new product (make sure you use a single XML per single product).
Aside the regular relationships of a given product (configuration elements, category placement etc.), the i18n content elements should be added with the same XML. Then at least a template CMS structure will be present with each product that is uploaded.
Unfortunately the Demo data just places rudimentary i18n. The relevant attributes to i18n on a Product are:
- Product.name
- Product.description
- Product.longDescription
The corresponding relationships are built using the ProductContent entity where the productContentTypeId should be set to 'NAME', 'DESCRIPTION' or 'LONG_DESCRIPTION' for the content that will map to name, description or longDescription respectively (attention, the Demo Data does not define the LONG_DESCRIPTION content items, so you will need to touch this, sorry!).
HTML META tags for default Product-pages
The content of HTML Meta tags on product pages are handled in
applications/order/webapp/ordermgr/WEB-INF/actions/entry/catalog/Product.groovy
The following content will be handled as i18n content, i.e. locale/fallback locale applies in <HTML><HEAD>...<META type="keyword" ...> tags:
- product.name (content items mapped as "PRODUCT_NAME" type)
- catalog.name (not i18n)
- productCategory.description (content items mapped as "DESCRIPTION" to all categories that this product is a member of)
The following content will be handled as i18n content, i.e. locale/fallback locale applies in <HTML><HEAD>...<META type="description" ...> tags:
- product.description (content items mapped as "DESCRIPTION" type)
Using this will help you with localized SEO (=Search Engine Optimisation) projects.
Translation of Text Elements using the CMS
This section assumes you have understood the relationship of Content, ContentAssociations and DataResources. Also, you should understand how a DataResource can be provided to the system.
w.i.p
Beyond Translation
As mentioned earlier, certain elements of i18n go beyond text translation. These elements typically comprise regionalized rules (e.g. for tax calculation) or entity instances (e.g. for general ledger). This section will discuss some general items in this.
Re-configuration of General Ledger
Actually, reconfiguring GL is a big step and dives deep into the data configuration of the Accounting module.
First of all, an understanding is required as to which of the accounting data entities require either customizations (changes that are related to the ORGANIZATION party that is using the GL) or localizations (changes that are related to the primary market that the ORGANIZATION is working in).
The requirements to provide a standard way of localizing General Ledger are also tracked on JIRA OFBIZ-3411 Introduce Localization Packages in General Ledger.
The following list shows all Entities that are defined in the files on OFBIZ_HOME/applications/accounting/data sorted by filename and then by occurence in the data files:
Filename | Entity | data character | relevant for |
|---|---|---|---|
AccountingSecurityData(.xml) | SecurityPermission | seed | |
| SecurityGroupPermission | seed | |
AccountingTypeData(.xml) | AcctgTransType | seed | |
| StatusType, StatusItems ACCTG_ENREC_STATUS | seed | |
| BudgetItemType | cust | |
| BudgetItem | cust | |
| EnumerationType, Enumeration GC_FULFILL | seed | |
| EnumerationType, Enumeration PGT_CODE | seed | |
| EnumerationType, Enumeration FARP_TYPE | seed | |
| EnumerationType, Enumeration FARP_METHOD | seed | |
| FinAccountTransType | seed | |
| FinAccountType | seed | |
| StatusType, StatusItems, StatusValidChange FINACCT_STATUS | seed | |
| StatusType, StatusItems, StatusValidChange FINACCT_TRNS_STATUS | seed | |
| EnumerationType, Enumeration FINACCT_TRANS_REASON | seed | |
| FixedAssetType | demo | |
| EnumerationType, Enumeration FXAST_CLASS | demo | |
| EnumerationType, Enumeration FXAST_COMPU_HARDWARE | demo | |
| EnumerationType, Enumeration FXAST_COMPU_SOFTWARE | demo | |
| FixedAssetIdentType | demo | |
| StatusType, StatusItems FIXEDAST_MNT_STATUS | demo | |
| Scheduled Job, Roles for Fixed Assets | demo | |
| FixedAssetProductType | demo | |
| GlAccountClass | demo | |
| GlAccountType | demo | |
| GlResourceType | demo | |
| GlXbrlClass | demo | |
| GlFiscalType | demo | localize |
| GlAccountCategoryType | demo | |
| InvoiceItemType | seed | |
| InvoiceItemAssocType | demo | |
| InvoiceType | demo | |
| InvoiceItemTypeMap | demo | |
| EnumerationType, Enumeration TAXABLE_INV_ITM_TY | demo | |
| PaymentMethodType | seed | localize? |
| PaymentType | seed | localize |
| PaymentGroupType | seed | localize |
| PaymentGatewayConfigType | demo | |
| PaymentGatewayConfig | demo | |
| PaymentGateway<PROVIDER> | demo | |
| CustomMethodType, CustomMethod | seed | |
| EnumerationType, Enumeration CREDIT_CARD_TYPE | seed | |
| StatusType BUDGET_STATUS | seed | |
| StatusType PARTY_ASSET_STATUS | seed | |
| StatusType, StatusItems, StatusValidChange INVOICE_STATUS | seed | |
| StatusType, StatusItems, StatusValidChange PMNT_STATUS | seed | |
| SettlementTerm | demo | |
| EnumerationType, Enumeration TAX_FORMS | demo | localize |
| EnumerationType, Enumeration COGS_METHODS | seed | |
| EnumerationType, Enumeration INVOICE_SEQ_MD | seed | |
| FixedAssetStdCostType | seed | |
| TaxAuthorityAssocType | demo | localize |
| TaxAuthorityRateType | demo | localize |
| RateType | seed | |
| PeriodType | seed | |
| WebSite | seed | |
| EnumerationType, Enumeration PTSOFTTFR | seed | |
| ProductAverageCostType | demo | |
| EnumerationType, Enumeration STR_CRDT_ACT | demo | |
| StatusType, StatusItems, StatusValidChange GLREC_STATUS | demo | |
DemoFinAccountData.xml | FinAccount | cust | |
| FinAccountStatus | cust | |
| FinAccountTrans | demo | |
| Payment | demo | |
DemoGeneralChartOfAccounts.xml | GlAccount | demo | |
DemoGlSetupData.xml | InvoiceItemType | seed | |
| PaymentMethodType | seed | |
| CostComponentCalc | cust | |
| GlJournal | cust | |
| PartyAcctgPreference | seed | |
| GlAccountOrganization | seed | |
| GlAccountTypeDefault | seed | |
| GlAccountCategory | seed | |
| PaymentGlAccountTypeMap | seed | |
| PaymentMethodsTypeGlAccount | seed | |
| CreditCardTypeGlAccount | seed | |
| FinAccountTypeGlAccount | seed | |
| VarianceReasonGlAccount | seed | |
| CustomTimePeriod | demo | |
| UomConversionDated | demo | |
| GlReconciliation | demo | |
| GlAccountCategoryMember | demo | |
DemoOrganisationData.xml | /any org data for accounting/ | demo | – |
PaymentsInvoices.xml | /Example Invoices/ | demo | – |
UsTaxAccountGroups.xml | GlAccountGroupType | demo | localize |
| GlAccountGroup | demo | localize |
Tax configuration
w.i.p.
Tools and Documents in this WIKI
Some language communities have started common dictionaries in order to align translation options and agree on some special terms. Examples are:
1 Comment
Jacques Le Roux
Hi Carsten,
I'd like to relate this page to related subject in FAQ. I'm not sure how for now. I guess putting this page directly under the FAQ and putting a link from bottom of Tips for UI labels translation. Or maybe rearrange all related pages in yours and then put under FAQ...