Joom!Fish - Multilingual Support for Joomla! 1.0.x

Two weeks ago I set up a Joomla! website for my sister. This week I installed Joom!Fish for her. Joom!Fish is an add-on component for Joomla! It allows you to manage multilingual contents within this CMS (Content Management System). In order to make it work, you have to find and download language pack(s) to go with it. The latest version of Joom!Fish is JoomFish_1.8.2. It is stable and compatible with Joomla! 1.0.x. Download JoomFish_1.8.2.zip here if you are interested.

• Login to your Joomla! interface, click on Installers/Components/ on the menu bar.
  

• Do not unzip the file you've downloaded earlier.
  

• Browse JoomFish_1.8.2.zip file and click on Upload File & Install button.
  

• If you've succeeded, you'll see Multilingual Content Manager for Joomla! shows up.

Here is the rest of the page says,

"Welcome to the Joom!Fish

Please make sure you read the following instructions carefully and try out a first example. After that you will find additional information, tutorials and support on the Joom!Fish website.
The Joom!Fish component supports you with design and creation of multilingual websites. This topic itself isn't that easy and so the handling of this component isn't easy.

This version of the Joom!Fish is only working together with the Joomla Version 1.0.7+. If you have a different version please refer to the project site to get a suitable version.

1. Step: Language installation

The first step is the installation of standard Joomla! language files. Those files can be found on the Joomla! extension website.
Please install all languages (there is no limit) you like to use within your site - using the Site -> Languages -> Install function.

2. Step: Language configuration

After you have done the language installation it is needed to activate the languages and give them a "natural" name and some other configuration values. This is done with the language configuration of the Joom!Fish (Components -> Joom!Fish -> Languanges).

First check: When you change the languages within the frontend (Solarflar template is patched) then all static text should change.

How to translate content?

After you are sure that the basic configuration of your site works for the static text translations let's try to translate dynamic content that is included in the database.

3. Step: Translation of information in the database

For the first simple test we try to translate the menu names in your website. For this please go to the control panel and select the function Translation. In this translation overview first select the language into which you like to translate. Then select the "content element" Menus. After you did that you get a list of all menus existing in the database. With selection the menu type "mainmenu" you reduce the list to all menu items used within this menu definition. Please translate all the menu items by clicking on the title name. It is important that the translation is published (last column).

Second check: When you change the languages within the frontend then the menu should show your translated menu names.

4. Step: Translation of additional information

For all other dynamic content within your database the translation process is exactly as described in step 3. For 3rd party Joomla! extensions you might need to install additional content element files with the configuration.

Joom!Fish development status

This release is a stable release and already the second enhanced version for the Joomla! 1.0.x code base. For Joomla! 1.5 we will provide a new Joom!Fish version using the new available features and framework provided. The development of Joom!Fish 2.0 started with the release of Joomla! 1.5 RC2 and will take still a little bit. Check out our website to get the latest news. If you have any questions please use our website forum and have fun using the Joom!Fish

Your Joom!Fish development team"

If you are using Joomla! 1.5, there is a beta Joom!Fish 2.0 for it. Not suggesting for productive websites. If you have questions, feel free to ask in comment.