Hi, I searched for this answer but couldn't find any reference to it:
Is it possible to customise language strings per theme? We want to change some of the text for the assignment tool (because we are using it without any grading, which is inappropriate for the course we are developing), but I would prefer to override it from our custom theme only, so that this doesn't have to be changed for all courses on the server.
TIA, Tim.
However, what you can do is this:
You can define a new 'language' say en_tim, which just has a few strings that are different from the normal en lang pack. (Using the same technique that lets fr_ca (French canadian lang pack) be almost the same as fr.)
Then you can cusomise the strings in that language.
That's interesting Tim, but where you add these strings? Or rather the pack?
You can't add them to the theme as that only caters for the strings that are generated by the theme as in custom settings pages et al.
If I was to create a theme specific language pack containing strings that I want to override that are in a course page or some other Moodle page, how would I go about that, if I was to use the same principle that you mentioned with regards 'tim_en'.
Mary
Sorry, I did not explian at all, did I. Sorry.
I think what you need to do is:
$string['parentlanguage'] = 'en';
$string['thislanguage'] = 'English (customised)';
$string['thislanguageint'] = 'English (customised)';
You can delete everything else in that file.
You may then need to do purge all caches before you can select that language in the Moodle UI, and use the Language customisation tool.
Thanks a lot Tim and others for the advice on this - that sounds like a really useful workaround. Before seeing your instructions Tim, I tried to use the Moodle "language customisation" interface, which actually created an "en_local" folder in the moodledata directory. I guess this is different to an actual language pack which has a parent language set? There seems to be no info on this in the Moodle docs that I could find.
Regarding your instructions, could I confirm the correct location of the custom language pack: /path_to_moodledata/lang/en_custom ?
Cheers.
Have a look at Translation here (Although they might still be versions of English, new languages packs are "translations")
Actually, en_local is different. That stores local changes to the en language pack, it does not create a new language pack called en_local.
If you create a new language pack called en_custom, as I explain above, and then edit it, you will get a folder called en_custom_local in moodledata.
Tim,
Tangental to this conversation, if you create a new language pack per your instructions and then make your desired alterations, can that pack be subsequently downloaded and used in other instances? We have four production instances running, and it would be extremely beneficial to me if I did not have to do the language customizations individually in each instance.
Buddy
Well, the strings are stored in files somewhere, so I think it is just a matter of finding those files and copying them. (You will have to work out the details on your own.)
I suppose it might be nice to have a UI for dowloading / uploading files like that. I guess it would be possible for someone to make an admin tool plugin for doing just that, if they were so minded.
I suppose (not tested) that you can also use the Moodle flavours plugin to transfer language customizations from one site to another...
Thanks again for the help everyone. The links in the docs are definitely helpful, but I was really looking for some instructions on how to create a new "child" English language pack to be used with my custom theme and course only, rather than how to "customise" a language pack via the web interface. More like what Tim posted above I guess.
I want to distribute one zip file that contains the language pack. So I don't want to use the web interface because that will create an en_custom_local folder. Therefore I need to edit the files directly, yes?
And should "defined('MOODLE_INTERNAL') || die();" be in my custom language pack files?
Thanks, Tim.
If you do what I said, you do create a child English language pack. If you want to edit more strings through code rather than the admin UI, then just put more files in the lang/en_custom folder.
