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Text replacements

The main advantage of Clonable is that you can easily modify the translations or text on the clone. Customizing text can be done with Clonable in several ways, but it is recommended to keep a certain order of options when trying to change text.

  1. Editor
  2. Text replacements
  3. Substitution rules
  4. Regular expressions

Editor

The easiest way to edit (most) text is to use our editor. This is especially useful if you want to edit text in the menu or footer, or if you want to edit text in just one place. At the top of the editor you can enter the URL of the page on which you want to change text. You can then very easily click on the text you want to change, rewrite the text and then save the change. If you want to change text in the menu or footer, you only need to make the change on one page. The menu or footer is then immediately changed on the other pages as well.

2. Text replacements

Where the editor allows you to change a certain word or sentence only on one spot at a time, the Text replacements allow you to change a word/phrase on the entire clone at once. This is useful, for example, if a particular subject term is incorrectly translated several times by Clonable. However, you need to be sure that the translation needs to be adjusted in each place, so pay attention to this. By using the Text replacements function, with one change you ensure that the incorrect translation is updated throughout the site. You also don't have to take capitalization into account. When you click on the 'Aa' to the left before the 'Add' button, Clonable ensures that the correct capitalization is adopted. However, this is not always necessary. Here are some examples.

text-replacement

Example 1

You have a Dutch webshop in soccer articles. You then clone this site to English. Unfortunately Clonable has translated 'doel' to 'purpose' instead of 'goal'. To replace this on the clone, enter 'purpose' in the orignal column, and 'goal' in the replacement column. Then also click the Case sensitive button. If 'goal' is in the middle or at the end of the sentence, for example. 'Buy this goal' then Clonable takes the translation without a capital letter. If 'goal' is at the beginning of the sentence, for example 'Goal made of steel', then both the correct translation and the correct capitalization of goal are used.

Example 2

You have an English web shop selling bags, including Coach brand bags. You clone this site to German. Unfortunately Clonable has taken the meaning of Coach literally and translated the brand name into 'Trainer'. You enter 'Trainer' in the original column, and 'Coach' in the replacement column. Because it is a brand name, you do not necessarily have to press the Case sensitive button, because brand names are always capitalized anyway. Throughout the site 'Trainer' will be replaced by 'Coach'.

Example 3

A client of ours has a web shop for water plants and pond supplies. We cloned their site into German, among other languages. Unfortunately Clonable translated the term 'Oxygen Plants' to 'Sauerstoffanlagen' instead of the correct translation 'Sauerstoffpflanzen'. In the original column we entered 'Sauerstoffanlagen', in the replacement column 'Sauerstoffpflanzen'. Here we did not need to press the Case sensitive button, because nouns are always capitalized in German, regardless of where they are in the sentence.

3. Substitution rules

You may find that using both the editor and the text replacement function are not possible or do not work. This is especially the case with the text in some buttons, links or forms. This is because that text is often enclosed in HTML, for example >word< or "word". Look in the source code to see how the text is listed, and adopt this way in the substitution rules as well. If you find this difficult or need help, please contact us.

Note:

There is a maximum of 20 substitution rules per clone. Therefore, do not use the substitution rules method too often, otherwise you may not be able to apply other changes that can only be solved with substitution rules.

4. Regular expressions

Usually all textual modifications can be solved with substitution rules. However, it can happen that things are even more difficult, because the text is really completely enclosed, or there are no substitution rules left to perform all these modifications, for example. These are very special cases, which can then be solved with regular expressions. However, this is very technical and it is not recommended to try this yourself. If you think you need regular expressions for your clone, please contact us.