Hello John,
Here is a simple workaround solution.
John,
You're right, multilingual doesn't work in the choices, I'm aware of that. It's a known issue, and there's already Tracker MDL-61286➚ for it (as Mary mentioned), in which there were some discussions in 2018, then nothing until 2022, and nothing since then.
In the Tracker, the problem is classified as a minor bug. Clearly, fixing the issue doesn't seem to be a priority and could take several more years.
While waiting for the problem to be resolved, I propose a workaround solution that offers the advantages of being extremely simple to implement and working like a charm. It simply involves including a small JavaScript code that displays the choices, for example, in French when the course is set to French.
Here's a screenshot of my example question's settings:
Dominique:
Thank you for the code. I am struggling to make it work…
Top of HTML:
<html dir="ltr" lang="fr-ca" xml:lang="fr-ca" class="yui3-js-enabled">
I have this set for javascript in the header portion of additional HTML. Works for other Javascript code:
<script src="https://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/3.7.1/jquery.min.js"></script>
The question:
<span lang="en" class="multilang">Drag and drop the following in order of precedence:</span>
<span lang="fr" class="multilang">Faites glisser et déposez les éléments suivants par ordre de privilège :</span>
<br><br>
<p dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;">1. 1<br></p>
<p dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;">2. 2<br></p>
<p dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;">3. 3<br></p>
<p dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;">4. 4<br></p>
<p dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;">5. 5<br></p>
<hr>
<script>
$(document).ready(function() {
$("body.lang-fr
span:contains('Vessel not answering the helm')").text("Navire dont la
barre ne répond plus");
$("body.lang-fr span:contains(Tug
with a 200m tow)").text("Remorqueur avec remorque de 200 m");
$("body.lang-fr
span:contains(Freighter in a dredged channel)").text("Cargo dans un
chenal dragué");
$("body.lang-fr
span:contains(Vessel casting nets)").text("Navire lançant des
filets");
$("body.lang-fr
span:contains(Vessel under sail but using the engine to charge the batteries
(transmission not engaged))").text("Navire à la voile qui utilise le
moteur pour recharger les batteries (transmission non enclenchée)");
});
</script>
My site default language is en_ca.
I have tried:
· body.lang-fr
· body.lang-fr_ca
· body.lang-fr-ca
Is there something else I am missing?
John
Hello John,
Try instead with:
$("html[lang='fr-ca'] span:contains(Vessel not answering the helm)").text("Navire dont la barre ne répond plus");
etc.
Hello John,
The issue stems from the fact that the "Drag and drop into text" question inserts non-breaking spaces between words when there are several words within the same choice. Removing them isn't too difficult, by adding a few lines of code, in order to easily spot the choices and translate them. Note that the space indicated in yellow in the code below is the invisible non-breaking space character that you must insert by pressing Alt+255 on a Windows computer.
Non-breaking spaces are intended to keep each choice on a single line even if it is long. In your case, the choices are not very long, so I did not insert non-breaking spaces between the translated words in order to keep the code as simple as possible. It would be easy to add them if necessary.
I've also added some code to translate the correct answer in case you need it.
I think that the French and French-Canadian language packs, "fr" and "fr-ca," are largely identical. I use the French language pack. If you're using the French-Canadian language pack, you'll need to change "fr" to "fr-ca" in the code. You'll also notice that I've used the "Multi-Language Content (v2)➚" plugin which I believe works better than the other version.
I have sent you by private email the XML file of your modified and working question. Don't forget to change "fr" to "fr-ca" and to restore the Alt-255 character if it did not survive the Moodel-XML-Moodle conversion.
// REMOVE HARD SPACES FROM CHOICES
$(".answercontainer span.draghome").each(function(){
str = $(this).text();
str = str.replaceAll(" "," ");
$(this).text(str);
});
John,
I'm not sure I understood you correctly. I hope it finally works for you. You will find the latest minor changes and an example where you can change the display language, at https://dynamiccourseware.org/course/view.php?id=119§ion=4&lang=en➚.
{mlang en_ca}{1:MULTICHOICE:~%100%One~Two}
{mlang}{mlang fr_ca}{1:MULTICHOICE:~%100%Un~Deux}{mlang}<br>
displays properly but as you can only answer one of the two questions, it says you are partially correct.
{1:MULTICHOICE:
~%100%{mlang en_ca}One{mlang}{mlang fr_ca}Un{mlang}
~{mlang en_ca}Two{mlang}{mlang fr_ca}Deux{mlang}
}<br>
{1:MULTICHOICE:
~{mlang en_ca}%100%One{mlang}{mlang fr_ca}Un{mlang}
~{mlang en_ca}Two{mlang}{mlang fr_ca}Deux{mlang}
}
both give Ce type de question requiert au moins 2 réponses.
When I started out I thought I would use the old style <span...> multilanguage format as it was native to Moodle (trying to avoid too many plugins). It seems to be more forgiving in that it accepts en or fr and displays properly, rather than requiring that I use en_ca and fr_ca. But I also am finding that it just works... I will probably start to use the {mlang} version in a number of areas, particularly when I run into the 255 string length limit, and it will be nice for allowing people, whose eyes will glaze over if confronted with html, to do some of the work on the site.
Good news! I just realized that there's a much simpler workaround!
Add the following script to the HTML code of the question (see the attached question for more details):
$("span:contains([1])").text("{mlang en}Text in English{mlang}{mlang fr}Texte en français{mlang}{mlang es}Texto en español{mlang}");
$("span:contains([2])").text("{mlang en}Text in English{mlang}{mlang fr}Texte en français{mlang}{mlang es}Texto en español{mlang}");
etc.
That's it! I tested it quickly and it seems to work like a charm! It should also be less daunting. (The simplicity of the workaround leads me to believe that the fix for the issue might not be so complicated after all, but I could easily be mistaken about that.)
You can try an example at https://dynamiccourseware.org/course/view.php?id=119§ion=3➚.
Hi Dominique:
Thanks for your solutions.
I have been playing (always dangerous) and building on what you have sent me. I have been able to use snippets of your code to have the Drag and Drop on Text work with the question (almost) normally. I have attached it if you want to perhaps make it a little more elegant and add it to your collection.
As it is, you can complete the question using the normal Choices fields. The Choices and the feedback will be displayed in the language of the page (with a caveat, see below). So, course creators don't have to play with html and JavaScript if they don't want to.
The script will respect the language of the Choices if you code the {mlang} tag properly. In that respect, it is no different that the rest of Moodle. So, you should be able to use any supported language.
And I figured out a workaround for the non-breaking space issue I think...
Things I have noticed about Drag and Drop:
Caveats:
(I think I had some more erudite things I was going to say, but it is late and they have leaked away…)
Anyway, thank you again for all your support.
John