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Hi there,
Trying to translate some words or phrases, or just after changing some English wording. Already hours spend on it, not finding where to go, and getting crazy? Or just editing all kinds of scripting to achieve this?
There might be an easier/better way…
"Help!!! (How) can I translate this?"
I18N Debugging
That's it, applying I18N Debugging. Oke, there's a bit more explanation needed. Though my first go-to, would almost always be applying I18N Debugging. This approach solves the majority of ServiceNow Community questions every week posted on this.
I18N Debugging is available when the "I18N: Internationalization" plugin is activated (out-of-the-box active for recent instances). Simply navigate to "System Localization > Enable I18N Debugging". This enables translation prefixes on field labels for the current user session.
Using the I18N Debugging will "Debug translated strings in the UI, show translation prefixes before the strings. These prefixes indicate which strings can be translated and which table contains the string and translations."
The prefixes and tables are described really well on the Docs. I've listed them here also:
| TRF | Translated Name / Fields [sys_translated] | System Localization > Translated Names / Fields |
| MSG | Messages [sys_ui_message] | System Localization > Messages |
| GMLD | Field Label [sys_documentation] | System Localization > Field Labels |
| TRT | Translated Text [sys_translated_text] | System Localization > Translated Text |
| CHC |
Choice [sys_choice] |
Examples
Oke, so how does this look like, what can we do with this? Some examples to help you get going!
Service Portal
Here an image of the out-of-the-box Service Portal index page with I18N Debugging enabled. Notice the translation prefixes on a lot of places, in this case mostly MSG and TRT.
So if you are after translating for example "How can we help?" place to be would be TRT, Translated Text. Would this be the first thing you would think of? Personally I would have had a look at Messages or the Service Portal widget code itself… though using I18N Debugging instantly shows you where you should be at.
Navigating to the Translated Text table and perform a search, would give you something like (or if missing, you could add this):
In this specific case, the Service Portal also used Instance options, with which you could easily change the English wording used.
Virtual Agent web client
Here an image of the Virtual Agent web client that displays a custom greeting topic with I18N Debugging enabled. Notice the translation prefixes on most of the messages, in this case MSG.
So if you are after translating for example "Good afternoon Mark." the place to be would be MSG, Messages. Most like the key for this would be "Good afternoon", "Good afternoon {0}", or "Good afternoon {0}.". Here's an image of the Message involved:
Also notice that the second message is not prefixed. So this would indicate… that you can't translate this one using Message, Translated Text, etc.. In this case this is also correct, on purpose I scripted this message without using gs.getMessage() or gs.getMessageLang().
Another image of the Virtual Agent web client which displays a custom greeting topic with I18N Debugging enabled. I18N Debugging is also helpful to spot words and phrases which cannot be translated. Like explained in the previous message. This image also shows some other areas which cannot be translated. For example you might want to have the Chat Header translated? No go. Or what about the month on the Date Picker, a recently asked question on the community. No go.
Idea Portal
Here an image of a small part from the Idea Portal with I18N Debugging enabled. A recently asked question on the community concerned if/how it would be possible to translate the categories. Notice that "All categories" is prefixed, though the categories themselves ("Compliance Project", "Human Resource/Employee Engagement", etcetera) are not! This would indicate that the categories themselves are not translateable, that the widget (or depending artifacts) have not been set up to support translations. While digging into the Service Portal widget, I indeed confirmed that this was not set up to support translations out-of-the-box 😞 A slight mistake from ServiceNow, though with using I18N Debugging quickly already discovered the issue mentioned in the community post.
Visual Task Board
The last example, haven't had any questions on this before, though just to give you an idea. Here an image of a Vusal Task Board with I18N Debugging enabled. The Visual Task Board code cannot be accessed/edited, this concerns the $vtb.do page. Though can we translate some of the words or phrases on it? As highlighted in the image, a lot can be translated even though you cannot access/edit the code of the Visual Task Board.
Recap
By adding some simple I18N Debugging, you could quickly pinpoint what you go to might be in your search for translating words or phrases. Instead of assuming its Messages, directly editing scripting, or wondering why something is not translatable… and eventually after spending hours on this, posting it on the ServiceNow Community, maybe waiting again some hours or even days before someone pinpoints your issue… apply I18N Debugging first!
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If any questions or remarks, let me know!
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Kind regards,
Mark Roethof
ServiceNow Technical Platform Architect @ Quint Technology
2x ServiceNow Developer MVP
2x ServiceNow Community MVP
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