Multilingual web site done with Grav

I've already mentioned this elsewhere, but my professional (I'm a translator, most of the time...) website is online:

https://www.marcocevoli.com

The site is complete in Italian only, but I'm going to add Spanish, English and Catalan contents in the next weeks.

I've used one of Paul Hibbitt's themes: https://github.com/hibbitts-design/grav-theme-quark-open-publishing, replacing fonts, colors and adding 2 sections with a blog layout on top of the "real" blog.

Almost all images come from https://unsplash.com/ and later processed as duotone in https://medialoot.com/duotones/

Any feedback is welcome.

Best regards,

Marco

Hello Marco,
Your website looks great! well done, given the fact that Grav is not very easy to deal with.

Last year I tried to make a store, but I got into some issues with the open source shopping cart and I never received a response from the developer, nice cart for Grav but it has an issue, and it is not maintained.

I was also trying to have a second language, without having to duplicate each page in the second language, but I was unable, I am not a technical person. Grav is nice, but it requires a person with suitable programming skills.

I see some error 404 pages, I was trying to learn what you mean with "Conectando los puntos" but the page linked does not exist. I know a multilingual website takes time.
Translating the corresponding italian page I was able to see your point, so I would suggest you to read "Science and Sanity: An Introduction to Non-Aristotelian Systems and General Semantics" from Alfred Korzybski.

1.- I would suggest to change the favicon for yours, your website is still using Grav's favicon.
2.- Also a language selector at the end of your horizontal menu, in the top right corner of your website.
Some resources:
Code a PHP Language Switcher https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qfkOrtkKO0I
Universal Language Selector with jQuery https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfTPOTwYy3M
PHP Multi Language Website Tutorial https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgvDMUrQ3vA
3.- Please review all your links so you will not get the 404 page.

By the way, nice credential page, What Mind Maps applications do you use?.

Regards
joejac

Hi Joe,

thanks a lot for your remarks.

@joejac:
I was also trying to have a second language, without having to duplicate each page in the second language, but I was unable, I am not a technical person. Grav is nice, but it requires a person with suitable programming skills.

I'm not sure if there is another way of making a Grav site multilingual, other than duplicating the .md files. I'm currently writing a tutorial about a way of using Git, Grav and OmegaT to streamline multilingual content. As soon as I publish this article, I'll post the link on this forum.

@joejac:
I see some error 404 pages

Yep, since the translation is not finished yet, there are still a few internal broken links.

@joejac:
"Science and Sanity: An Introduction to Non-Aristotelian Systems and General Semantics”

Thanks a lot for this! I really appreciated when fellow users suggest content to other users.

• Favicon is on the to-do list.
• The language selector is fine where it is (bottom of the page). Putting it next to the menu clutters the menu and I deliberately avoided that. I know it's not standard, but since the language is automatically detected, it shouldn't make a huge difference in terms of usability.

@joejac:
What Mind Maps applications do you use?

I'm a big fan of open source software, so I mainly use FreeMind.

Thanks for your reply Marco.
I used FreeMind, but now I am using the free version of xMind and TheBrain, both have its particular strengths. I am still looking for the "perfect" Mind Map tool.

Normally users look for the language selector on top of the web site: header or top lef/right column, that is the recommended place. I would suggest to look at this website, to see how they place the language selector:
http://real-estate.iwinter.com.hr/index.php/en?color=green
Regards
joejac

@joejac:
I would suggest to look at this website

The position might be standard, but that widget goes against 2 basic rules in localization:

• flags used as language indicators (see http://www.flagsarenotlanguages.com/blog/why-flags-do-not-represent-language/)
• ISO language codes instead of language names (EN and FR might be recognizable, but most users expect to see the language name in its own language, that is "English", "Français", "Italiano", "Deutsch" etc.)

Kind regards
Marco

Hello Marco,
Technically speaking you are completely right. But we are humans and we, mainly, respond visually. Despite all the technical reasons, people will immediately locate the flag and switch. I did some bilingual sites, and some visitors, that knew the owners of the sites, suggested them about "improvements" of the websites but never commented about the flags.

I spent some time to find that you had the languages below, in the footer, and that is because I wanted to help and give suggestions. Visitors do not pay much attention to footers, they look for content of their interest, and where to find it (menus on top horizontal or left vertical, and the center area for content) A first-time visitor does not have much patience.

You can also use the language switch with the full language name and omit the flags and you save space in the header, especially if you have more than 2 languages. With the selector arrow it might catch the attention, but nothing like the flags for fast identification.
That is my humble opinion, aside from the standards.

If you prefer your languages text buttons in the footer like it is now, you have plenty of space below, so the switcher is not necessary.

Best regards

Thanks, I really appreciate your (and everyone's) feedback. Regarding the language switcher, like you noticed from my site, I work in the language industry, so I should drink my own medicine. I won't use flags, because of the reasons well explained in the mentioned link.

On top of that, this issue might not be perceived as important if someone lives, let's say, in the US. But I live in Catalonia, Spain. National flags bear a strong connotation here (and in many other countries), so I really prefer not to step on that ground.

If this was a site for a client, I would probably use a switcher in the upper part, but since it's my personal site and I don't expect a significant difference in traffic regardless of what I use (with/without switcher, top or bottom), I won't bother moving the current language menu. 🙂

Buena suerte y mucho éxito con tu sitio web Marco.
Cataluña es muy bonita, pero Italia también, tengo buenos amigos que han regresado a su Italia natal y están muy felices allí.
Soy español, como quisiera poder regresar a mi país.
Saludos.
José