Creating Bilingual web site.. Most efficient way...

[handy andy]

Hi,

I am making a Bilingual website from scratch. I have almost completed the english part and will next translate and create the indonesian part. As all the menu's as well as text will have to change I was wondering should I complete a seperate site (will be easier with repeating objects) and then copy each individual page over to form one or is there a simpler method?

Cheers

Andy

[pauland]

Basically, as you have said, make a clone in the other language.

[gwpriester]

I agree with Paul.

Save your English site with a new name, for example Indonesian Site. Then the changes will only apply to that site.

You can publish one version to a folder on your web hosts computer, for example indonesian. Then from the main site, if someone click on the Indonesian language option, link to www.yoursitename.com/indonesian

Publish to this folder just as you would to the main directory. So you will have an index.htm or index.html file, the index_htm_files folder, etc.

Link the English Language version to the main site, www.yoursitename.com

[handy andy]

Yes this seems like the most obvious method. Thanks for your input. I am glad I didn't create two web files and then try to import all pages from one to the other. It would have been a very inprecise and time consuming method. Thanks again.

Andy

[w00dy]

It may not be what you need but I adopted a slightly different approach using layers on a single site. Basically it was a prospectus that we needed in multiple languages. You can have a look at it here: http://www.hhtc.org.uk/website/multipr/p1-welcome.htm

[handy andy]

Thanks Woody,

I have about 40 to 50 pages so wouldn't work for my website but I think it is an innovative idea. May be useful for future projects.

Thanks for the advice....

Andy