From the first post in December 2013THE Ethereum Foundation (EF) The blog is the main means of communication for teams within the FE. From event announcementshas grant waves, protocol upgradesregular specific team updates or discussing Ethereum’s vision and roadmap, the blog has been a useful resource for those looking to stay in the loop.
However, there is a big problem: despite our global Ethereum community, this information was mainly only available in English. Accessing this information is a challenge for the billions of non-English speakers around the world.
ethereum.org and the translation program
We have already seen ethereum.org demonstrate a successful, community-driven initiative. template for Ethereum translations. In 2019, ethereum.org began translating its open source educational content into multiple languages. Over time, this effort expanded to 48 languages available and millions of words translated each year by thousands of volunteer contributors.
An essential element of the success of the translation program is its thousands of enthusiastic contributors. For many, translating is one of the most meaningful ways to contribute to the Ethereum ecosystem in order to learn, teach, and give back to the community.
Ethereum.org currently has:
- 3,800 contributing translators
- 48 languages live on site
- 2.9 million words translated in 2021
- 1.9 million words translated in 2022 to date
Do people use translations?
The Ethereum.org team’s translation experience highlights the value of making Ethereum content available in multiple languages. The takeaway is clear: the more content we translate, the higher the percentage of overall traffic directed to translated pages. The trend is consistent, with translated content representing 5% of page views at the end of 2019 and now representing 22% of total page views. This is intuitive: even English-proficient community members report preferring to read in their native language.
The most complete translation of ethereum.org content is in simplified Chinese. The result? 8% of all traffic to Ethereum.org is intended for Simplified Chinese version of the website.
Translate everything!
As the success of translations on ethereum.org became evident, other obvious translation opportunities presented themselves.
THE Ethereum Staking Launchpadan interactive guide to going solo staking and setting up a validator, has been translated into 20 languages.
Since the beginning of 2022, we have also added some translations to some blog posts (e.g. recent testnet upgrades). However, this was a suboptimal temporary solution given that the blog did not natively support internationalization. The translations were not easily indexable, searchable, or intuitive to find.
Blog Updates: What’s Changed?
Below is a brief overview of the work we have done so far and what we plan to improve next.
Support for internationalization
Since its launch today, the EF Blog has had full support for internationalization, meaning that when you choose a language to view the blog (e.g. blog.ethereum.org/zh), you will be able to view all messages in your target language. This update includes a language-specific search function) and RSS feeds dedicated to each language (e.g. blog.ethereum.org/zh/feed.xml). We also improved the layout for right-to-left languages, such as Arab.
Performance Improvements
As part of the blog rebuild, we migrated the code to a completely new technology stack (from Jekyll has Next.js). Next.js is a modern web framework optimized for end-user performance. We expect the performance improvements to be visible to everyone, but those without access to high-speed internet should see the most significant improvements in loading speeds and user experience.
Accessibility Improvements
This rebuild also improves the overall accessibility of the blog by providing a better experience with screen readers, improved keyboard navigation, and updates to some colors to increase contrast. These improvements are largely thanks to our UI library, Chakrawhich adheres closely to Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG)— well done to their team of open source developers!
UI/UX Improvements
We’ve simplified the site menu to improve the browsing experience on all devices. We also redesigned the archive And research pages to present the content more clearly.
Future projects
While this new blog is a dramatic improvement over the previous version, we would still like to make further upgrades.
Email Subscriptions
As part of the blog rebuild, we have improved support for RSS readers. So instead of having to periodically check the blog or rely on our Twitter for updates you can subscribe to the RSS feed of your preferred language.
However, in 2022, people expect a simpler option: email notifications. This is next on our priority list as we believe it would be a significant improvement to the blog user experience for everyone. Stay tuned!
Extended languages
ethereum.org has demonstrated the demand for a wide variety of languages. Today we launch with support for 16 languages but we hope to expand these options soon. Which brings us to our next point…
Get involved!
Would you like to help translate the EF blog?
Find everything you need to participate in our translation program.
Thank you in advance for improving the accessibility of Ethereum information for millions of community members around the world!
