Membership Plugin

WordPress Membership Plugin

How to Translate the Simple Membership Plugin

This page provides instructions on how to translate the Simple Membership Plugin into your preferred language. Whether you’re a developer or a user looking to customize the plugin for your locale, this guide will walk you through the process of creating, testing, and submitting translation files.

Table of Contents

Translate it on WordPress’s Translation Project

You can translate the plugin by going to the following page:

https://translate.wordpress.org/projects/wp-plugins/simple-membership/

Or you can translate it locally using the following steps and send us the translation files.

Using Loco Translate Plugin (Alternative Translation Option)

The Loco Translate plugin can be used to translate the plugin easily also. You can read the steps on this web page (this is an external link) to learn how you can use the Loco Translate plugin to create a translation for your site.

Translate it Locally

Here is a step by step guide on how you can translate the Simple Membership plugin in your language.

Step 1)

Download and install Poedit (https://poedit.net/download). This is a free translation tool.

Step 2)

Get the plugin’s main POT file (simple-membership.pot).

You can find this POT file inside the ‘languages‘ folder of this plugin. 

simple-membership/languages/simple-membership.pot

Copy this POT file somewhere on your computer so you can easily access it (you will need to browse to this file later).

Step 3)

Run Poedit software (if it is not running already).

Step 4)

We have to create a NEW translation from the main plugin’s POT file (simple-membership.pot). So do the following steps to create a new translation.

Click on the “Create New” button as shown on the following screenshot. It will open a file open dialogue box so you can select the POT file (simple-membership.pot).

Alternatively, you can go to the “File” menu and click on the “New from POT/PO file” option as shown on the following screenshot:

It will show you a file open dialogue box so you can select the POT file.

Step 5)

Select the simple-membership.pot file from the file open dialogue box. You prepared this file in Step 2 above.

It will open the POT file and show you a translation language selection window.

Step 6)

Select the language that you want to do a translation for.

Next, you will be able to start doing you translation.

Step 7)

Select each translatable text and add the translation in the box that says “Translation“.

Finish translating the whole file.

Step 8)

After you are done translating, you can generate the PO and MO files for your language.

Go to File -> Save as to save your translations (it will generate the .po and .mo files).

If you still need to update some more strings, you can update them and then save the file again.

Step 9)

Contact us and send us the translated .mo and .po files and we will add it to the plugin.

Testing the Translation Files

To test or use the language file on your site, follow these steps:

1) Name the Files

Ensure the files are named in the correct format.

The “System Info” tab under the “Tools” menu displays the language locale used on your site. Refer to the screenshot below for an example. This information helps determine the correct name for the full language file in your installation.

In the “languages” folder of the plugin, you will find examples of the file naming conventions for various languages.

Here is an example for the German language:

simple-membership-de_DE.po
simple-membership-de_DE.mo

2) Upload the Files

Place these files in the “languages” folder of the plugin, which is located at:

wp-content/plugins/simple-membership/languages

Additionally, place the language files in the following location:

wp-content/languages/plugins

3) Test the Translation

First, navigate to the Tools > System Info tab and confirm that the language files have been uploaded to both locations mentioned in the previous step. A green checkmark should appear next to the ‘Translation Files‘ field. Refer to the screenshot below for an example.

Verify if the translation works correctly. It is essential to test the translation yourself as you understand the language. If we upload it on our end, we won’t be able to verify the accuracy since we don’t understand the language.

Existing File Translation Update Steps

To update an existing translation file that has become outdated, I follow these steps:

  1. Open the existing .po file using Poedit (or any translation tool that you are using) and compare it with the main plugin’s POT file (simple-membership.pot).
  2. Add or modify the necessary translations directly in Poedit. Most of the existing translations in my language are already accurate and filled, so I only update what’s needed.
  3. Once all new and updated translation strings are complete in the .po file, generate the corresponding .mo file using Poedit.
  4. Upload the updated .po and .mo files to the following locations:
    • The languages folder within the plugin directory: /wp-content/plugins/simple-membership/languages/
    • The global WordPress language directory: /wp-content/languages/plugins/

Navigate to the Tools > System Info tab and confirm that the language files have been uploaded to both locations. The screenshot below shows an example of how it should appear when the translation files are correctly placed in both directories.

This ensures that the updated translations are applied correctly and accessible by the plugin.

Sending the Translation Files to Us

If you would like us to include your translation files in the plugin, please contact us to initiate the process. Once we’ve established communication, you can reply to our email and attach the translation files for our review.