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Sascha1982's avatar
Sascha1982
Copper Contributor
Feb 27, 2019

Challenges with multilingual fields in SharePoint

Hello everyone,

I want to extend an existing multilingual environment in SharePoint (Online).

For this reason, I created some new site columns in a first step:

  • I gave each field an internal name: MyColumn
  • Then I gave them display names in English and German: My Column / Meine Spalte

In a second step I connected the new site columns to existing site content types. 

The site content types are already connected to local lists and libraries.

 

I thought that employees with German or English preferred language settings will now see the columns in their language. 

Unfortunately, it's a little bit different. People who set English as preferred language can view lists and document libraries as expected. 

Employees who set German as their preferred language cannot see the translation.

In below screenshot you can see my test with the columns "Email Date1" and "Net Total1":

 

I expected to see the values "E-Mail Datum1" and "Gesamt (Netto)".

 

Now, If analyse the site content type, I can see that everything is displayed correctly:

 

What did I do wrong? What do I have to do to translate the columns the right way?

 

Thanks in advance for your support!

 

BR,

Sascha

SharePoint Online

2 Replies

  • MartinLaplante's avatar
    MartinLaplante
    Iron Contributor
    Feb 28, 2019

    The order in which you do things matters, and this bug has existed for about a decade.  You have to translate the site column MUI before you add the content type to the list, any MUI changes done after that are not inherited by the list.

     

    In the image below, I have created 3 site columns "Add before", "Add after", and "Translate after".  I translated "Add before" and added it to the content type, then added the content type to the list.  Then I translated "Add after" and added both "Add after" and "Translate after" to the content type.  Then I translated "Translate after".  This is the result:

     

     

    Only the translation that was done before adding the content type to the list is relfected in the list.  This is because this is not true inheritance.  The columns are copied to the list at the time the content type is added.  These columns get updated when certain properties of the ancestor column is changed, but that does not include changes to the MUI translations.  You can re-translate the column name manually in the list itself.

    • Sascha1982's avatar
      Sascha1982
      Copper Contributor
      Mar 01, 2019

      Hi Martin,

      Thanks for your response.

      I did some further tests and I think that there is a general issue.

      Whenever I create a website column, the translations will not be pushed to the SharePoint lists. That means, that I can also reproduce the behavior when I translate the column before adding it to a content type and to a list.

      The site content type looks as expected. The list content type only shows the English translation.

      Do you also know this behavior? Is there a way to reconnect the list content type to the site content type?

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