prototyping language selector

[vinzv]

This is a first CSS/template only prototype for a language selector as mentioned in #6043. It's a first draft so any comments or ideas welcome!

[MrPetovan]

How do we decide which languages should be in the select list?

[MrPetovan]

Is this how you plan to add languages to the list?

[vinzv]

Oh, no. It's a leftover from some tryout where I duplicated the process of the location prompt. Just ignore it. ;-)

[Quix0r]

Or better purge it? I guess this whole PR should be marked as WIP?

[vinzv]

How do we decide which languages should be in the select list?

I haven't thought about it in detail but my first guess is to use all languages available generally in the system.

[MrPetovan]

Friendica has at least a partial interface translation for about 20 languages (see view\lang folder), do you plan on including them all?

[vinzv]

As said I'm not decided yet and open to discussions but, yes, as they are potentially used by users it would be an option.

[MrPetovan]

I'd rather add a new profile fields where you can specify all the languages you're talking, and limiting the select box to that short list. But this is definitely a bigger time investment, and your simpler solution with all the available languages should be implemented first so that the feature can be published faster.

[vinzv]

Heck, I totally forgot the profile way. Sounds good to me!

[rabuzarus]

One thing. When adding another icon to the JOT please have in mind that there are also mobiles with small screens.

[tobiasd]

How does it look in the other themes?

[MrPetovan]

So far it's a frio-only prototype.

[vinzv]

One thing. When adding another icon to the JOT please have in mind that there are also mobiles with small screens.

This is how it looks with a (simulated) Nexus 5X:

Other devices with even smaller resolutions look the same way or at least very similar with just some wrapping:

[JeroenED]

What is the current status here?

[MrPetovan]

Just realized this could be included in #7309

[Quix0r]

Multiple language selection would be appropriate (profile) as people tend to speak/read/write more than one language.

[wiwie]

With this prototype, would it be possible to compose the post in multiple languages simultaneously? It seems to me, that one can only choose one language. True multilanguage composing would thus not be possible?

Would it instead be possible to add multiple text fields, one per chosen language? possibly distribute them over tabs per language?

[vinzv]

The idea to switch between languages (see the GIF in my initial post) and then compose the respective text. So, yes, it would offer true multilanguage composing. But still it's just a prototype as processing the various languages would need more work protocol-wise, to my understanding.

[Quix0r]

Conflicting change in this PR. Plus you could add the language code to <input> and <textarea> form fields as well.

[MrPetovan]

It's a prototype so it isn't meant to be merged as is, I'll convert it back to Draft.

[Quix0r]

Ah, okay. :-)

[gunchleoc]

If this project is still ongoing, maybe make it similar to the language selector that Mastodon has now?

The way they do it:

1. Define 1 default language in UI settings
2. Recently used languages on top
3. Search field will filter the list using matches in native name, English name and locale code

Button icon is the currently selected locale code.

[damianwajer]

What is the status of this PR in terms of the idea of how it could work in Friendica? Is there any chance to implement selecting the language per post basis? It's a great accessibility feature, and Mastodon implements it very well. Unfortunately, Friendica sets the content language to the author's profile language. There is a workaround to change the post language: user can go to the profile settings page on the Friendica instance each time to change "your language" setting. Then after sending a message, switch back to the regular language.

The simplest solution I can think of, which would improve accessibility in a meaningful way, is native <select> with a list of options based on "can read" ("can write"?) setting from the user's profile. So the selection will be short without the need for a custom selector component (at least in the first iteration).

Random thoughts:

• Friendica-compatible apps like Fedilab or Tusky have UI to set a content language for each post, but Friendica doesn't respect it. Instead, Friendica always sets the language to the Friendica UI language of the user ("your language" – language setting from the user's profile on Friendica instance). Maybe in the first iteration of this feature, we could just support such a setting in other apps? And after that, in separate PR, implement language selector on Friendica's side?
• I imagine that many users have UI language set to a different language then post content they write, and it's always marked wrong, which can be a real pain for, e.g. screen reader users.
• There is already "can read" option in the language filter addon with the name langfilter_languages. Maybe we can re-use it to determine languages to show for the language selector? If not, a separate setting in the profile is just fine ("can write"?).

[MrPetovan]

This is a frontend PR only, with no connection to the backend. The requested feature still needs to be added to the backend before this PR can go forward.

[damianwajer]

@MrPetovan That's right, but I think this PR is the closest to my idea, so I've decided to comment here. If there is a better place, I will be happy to see it and maybe help. There is also a possible related issue: #11453 (select options could be populated with values from the spoken languages setting).

[gunchleoc]

One more UI thing I noticed that Mastodon web UI does: When replying, it sets the language to the post that you're replying to. This is a great convenience feature for multilingual people.