# Translating Firefly III {#translating-firefly-iii}


First of all, thank you for taking the time to help get Firefly III translated in as many languages as possible. Translation work is tedious and concentrated work, and I appreciate all your efforts. To make translating Firefly III as easy as possible I wrote this little guide to get you started.


## Target language {#target-language}


Ensure the language you want to translate in is listed [on this page](https://crowdin.com/project/firefly-iii). If not, [see the instructions on the Support page](https://sourcey-firefly.pages.dev/explanation/support/index.md).

If you contact me, tell me what your language is called _in your language_. For example, Dutch in Dutch is `Nederlands`.


## Translate online {#translate-online}


Crowdin has a pretty fancy user interface for translating Firefly III texts. This works pretty well for most people, but you lack context: you don't know where your text is going to end up. But this works for most text.


## Translate offline {#translate-offline}


You can hack your installation of Firefly III to make it show your language, even if it's not officially enabled yet.


### Enable the language {#enable-the-language}


First, open `app/config/firefly.php` in your favorite text editor and search for the languages' configuration. You should see a bunch of languages listed in a row:

![Enabled languages](/_media/03f946cb1eb6a80b9428.png)

Below that, a list of languages that are not enabled yet. Each line is preceded by `//`. If it's not there yet, you can add it.

![Disabled languages](/_media/07bde19292bac8e4d65a.png)

Remove the `//` to enable the language of your choice.

![Klingon can now be translated](/_media/afd033947239bb076ab3.png)

You can now select this language in your settings.

![Klingon can now be translated](/_media/57faa961606b967da019.png)


### Download the right files {#download-the-right-files}


Everything in Firefly III will still be in English. You need to download a zip file with the correct files in them, and place it in your Firefly III installation directory.

Go to [Crowdin](https://crowdin.com/project/firefly-iii), select your language and download a zip file of your language.

![Download zip file](/_media/30be587b17f79bfbc3f5.png)

In the zip file, you'll find a directory called `resources/lang/xx_XX` where `xx_XX` is your language code. The PHP files you find in that directory inside the zip file must be extracted to `firefly-iii/resources/lang/xx_XX`. Change `xx_XX`, of course.

![Zip file structure](/_media/b1bc8cdd32e9b21d82c5.png)

Once the files are in place, you can start editing them directly. If you refresh your instance of Firefly III, the text should be translated instantly.

![The very first translation](/_media/5272f235cb75e0922cba.png)

![The result in Firefly III](/_media/6bd1177344d3dd696933.png)

Once you're done with a file, send the file [to me](https://sourcey-firefly.pages.dev/explanation/support/index.md), so I can upload the results to Crowdin.