[Resolved] Translating dates

[sirlouen]

How can I translate dates in posts?
For example:

[Leo]

Hi there,

I feel like it should be translated by default.

Can you confirm that your site language is not set to English?
https://wordpress.org/support/article/settings-general-screen/

Let me know 🙂

[sirlouen]

Hello @Leo, the language is fine, check it in the bottom (Everything in spanish, comments and all that), just the date is not being translated, even the “By %s” is being translated as you may see

https://neocinismo.com/poder-como-fuego/

(I have updated it to the DD/MM/YYYY format so it technically solves it, but still concerned of why it’s not being translated to something like “8 Enero 2020” instead of “8th January 2020”

[Tom]

I’m surprised WordPress doesn’t do this by default.

Try this:

add_filter( 'generate_post_date_output', function( $output, $time_string ) {
    $time_string = '<time class="entry-date published" datetime="%1$s" itemprop="datePublished">%2$s</time>';

    if ( get_the_time( 'U' ) !== get_the_modified_time( 'U' ) ) {
        $time_string = '<time class="updated" datetime="%3$s" itemprop="dateModified">%4$s</time>' . $time_string;
    }

    $time_string = sprintf( $time_string,
        date_i18n( 'c', strtotime( get_the_date() ) ),
        date_i18n( '', strtotime( get_the_date() ) ),
        date_i18n( 'c', strtotime( get_the_modified_date() ) ),
        date_i18n( '', strtotime( get_the_modified_date() ) )
    );

    return sprintf( // WPCS: XSS ok, sanitization ok.
        '<span class="posted-on">%1$s<a href="%2$s" title="%3$s" rel="bookmark">%4$s</a></span> ',
        apply_filters( 'generate_inside_post_meta_item_output', '', 'date' ),
        esc_url( get_permalink() ),
        esc_attr( get_the_time() ),
        $time_string
    );
}, 10, 2 );

I’m not 100% sure it will work, but it’s worth a shot.

[sirlouen]

I’ve found the trick, with a combination of the filter option_time_format to adapt the format to j F Y instead of the default english version, and wpml_register_single_string and translating all the month’s strings manually.

Maybe it’s not the best and by using date_i18n it’s straight forward. But I’ve tested that filter and the code shows right but not the strings within the code (the ones that theoretically shall be shown)

[Tom]

That sounds like a good solution as well! 🙂

[sirlouen]

The good part, is that combining with the Amp plugin, since the default behaviour of WP is not based on the i18n function, it works site-wide, not only in the parts that have been templated with GP.

[Tom]

Ah right, that’s awesome! Thanks for sharing what worked for you, we appreciate it 🙂

[Author]

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