News
Feature of the month: Multilingualism in the wiki
With ILIAS 9, the ILIAS object Wiki finally gets the multilingual feature: Wikis can now be created in several languages and no longer have to be created as separate language versions. This makes it much easier to create multilingual content in ILIAS.
What is (not really) new?
The multilingualism function on ILIAS is actually not new at all, but has been around for a while, albeit only for a limited selection of objects: Category, course, folder, group, object block, content pages, ILIAS learning module and, since ILIAS 9, the wiki.
Language variants of the title, description and actual content can be created via the “Multilingualism” tab.
In the wiki, users then have the option of manually selecting the desired display language. For other objects, the display language is automatically selected according to the language setting in the ILIAS profile.
How does it work?
- Create a wiki object or navigate to an existing wiki object for which you have administration rights.
- Open the wiki settings and navigate to the “Multilingualism” tab.
- Activate multilingualism by clicking on the “Activate multilingualism” button.
- You will be asked to specify the base language. This will assign existing content in this wiki to the selected language.
- You can then add further languages using the “Add language” button.
- You can now create your own titles and descriptions for each added language.
- You can also switch back and forth between the different languages in the wiki's page editor and create customized content.
What can it look like?
We are currently revising our “Digital Teaching Toolbox” with regard to multilingualism. Previously, a second wiki had to be created for the English version and maintained in parallel. With the new functionality for wikis, there is now an initial additional effort because the content from both wikis has to be merged, but in the long term the effort is greatly reduced.
Here are two images of the start page of the Digital Teaching Toolbox in German and English. You can switch between the languages at the touch of a button:
Screenshot of the english version.
Screenshot of the german version.What are the advantages for teaching?
The new function means that different language versions of the content can be created in the same object with relatively little effort. At the University of Freiburg, these are presumably German, English and possibly French. The individual wiki pages do not have to be created for each language, but are automatically generated in all specified languages when they are created. Only the content of the pages then needs to be filled in the appropriate language. After completion, students or other users can then display the wiki in their desired language and flexibly switch to another language at any time.