I can think of many excuses to explain why I’d, until recently, neglected my WordPress plugins. For some time now, I’ve only set aside time to bump their WordPress-version compatibility and respond to the occasional support thread. As my plugins’ users may have recently noticed, this has changed. I added block-editor (Gutenberg) support to both External Permalinks Redux and WP Revisions Control. I also fixed all of my actively-maintained plugins so that they can be translated through translate.wordpress.org. Today I’m revisiting a plugin, Automatically Paginate Posts, that I have ignored for more than two years; it requires some serious revisions to make it compatible with the block editor, and now feels like the right time to undertake that effort.
One interesting discovery that came from fixing my plugins’ support for translations was the realization that, while I thought I’d done everything correctly, I’d actually overlooked several key details. I was diligent about wrapping all user-facing strings in appropriate translation functions, and I’d followed best practices for building strings in ways that made them translatable as a whole (rather than concatenating translated chunks), but I hadn’t chosen proper text domains nor had I called all of the functions required to apply available translations.
Lessons Learned
- If your plugin supports WordPress versions older than 4.0, both the
Text Domain
plugin header and a call toload_plugin_textdomain()
are required. - If your plugin includes a block-editor component that contains translatable strings, a call to
wp_set_script_translations()
is required. - The plugin’s text domain must match its slug on WordPress.org if you wish to allow the community to submit translations that aren’t bundled with the plugin itself.
There’s a lengthy documentation page that covers all of the above and more: https://developer.wordpress.org/plugins/internationalization/how-to-internationalize-your-plugin/. I should’ve paid closer attention to it.
Supporting My Plugins
If you find any of my plugins beneficial and would like to support my development efforts, please visit my donation page for links to various ways to provide financial support.