Translating your scenario

BranchTrack editor allows you to export all texts from a scenario to an Excel file, translate them and then import back to automatically replace all contents with your freshly translated texts. Here's how:

1. Open your scenario and click the Translations tab by clicking a globe icon: 

2. Click the "Download XLSX file" button and save the file to your hard drive.

3. Open the file in MS Excel. The file contains two tabs: Scenario and Interface. 

Please note that you can also use Google Spreadsheets, Apple Numbers or Open Office as long as you save it back in XLSX format.

4. The Scenario tab contains your original scenario content. The first three columns are locked and the fourth column is empty and editable. This is where you translate your scenario line by line; every scene, every choice, every feedback, even the scenario title.

5. The Interface tab contains all texts that are used in the player interface, e.g. words "score" or "continue". The first two columns are locked and the third column is editable. This is where you input your translations.

6. Once you have entered all translations, save the Excel file and go back to the BranchTrack editor. Open the Translations tab and click "Upload XLSX file" to, well, upload the file.

7. Before finalizing the translation, BranchTrack will check your file for format. Here are potential warnings that you might encounter:

• Scenario IDs don't match! Seems like this translation file is from another scenario.
  This means that the file you are uploading has been exported from a different project. This could be an honest mistake (and we are happy we stopped you before you ruined your scenario) or this could be your intention, e.g. if you have created a duplicate project. If you are absolutely sure that you want to apply the translation to this project, click "Proceed". 
  
  
• Unknown text elements found! The imported file contains texts that we didn't find in this scenario.
  This means that the file you are trying to upload has more content than your scenario. Maybe you have deleted some scenes while the Excel file was being translated, or you just have a wrong version. Again, if you are absolutely sure that this is OK, click "Proceed". The extra text elements will be ignored.

8. Click "Apply translation" to replace all texts with their translations. Any empty lines will be ignored. 

That's it! Please share your experience and suggestions with us!

P.S. Did you know that you can "translate" a project from English to English as a means of quickly updating a lot of text, e.g. replacing a certain phrase or a word?