Title: Confusing string composition
Last modified: April 25, 2017

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# Confusing string composition

 *  Moderator [tobifjellner (Tor-Bjorn “Tobi” Fjellner)](https://wordpress.org/support/users/tobifjellner/)
 * (@tobifjellner)
 * [9 years, 1 month ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/confusing-string-composition/)
 * Hi,
    I’m one of the GTE:s (translation editors) for WordPress in Swedish. I just
   noted that a string in WP spamshield is composed in a way that makes it look 
   strange for translators. I’m referring to [https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/wp-spamshield/trunk/includes/admin-settings.php#L327](https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/wp-spamshield/trunk/includes/admin-settings.php#L327)
   i.e. `echo '<br />'.WPSS_EOL.'<span style="color:red;"><strong>' . sprintf( __('
   The log file may not be writeable. You may need to manually correct the file 
   permissions.<br />Set the permission for the "%1$s" directory to "%2$s" and all
   files within it to "%3$s".</strong><br />If that doesn\'t work, then please read
   the <a href="%4$s" %5$s>FAQ</a> for this topic.', 'wp-spamshield' ), WPSS_PLUGIN_DATA_PATH,'
   755', '644', rs_wpss_append_url( WPSS_HOME_URL.'faqs/?faqs=5#faqs_5' ), 'target
   ="_blank"' ) . '</span><br />'.WPSS_EOL;`
 * The problem here is that you’ve put the tag `<strong>` outside of the string 
   to be translated. This means that a correct translation should include the end
   tag, but the translator won’t see the beginning of this tag pair. There are two
   ways to fix:
    1. (preferred). Break this rather long string into two separate
   strings and place the formatting outside of the strings. 2. (also ok). Move the
   start tag into the string to be translated, thus achieving tag balance inside
   the string.

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## Tags

 * [i18n](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/i18n/)

 * 0 replies
 * 1 participant
 * Last reply from: [tobifjellner (Tor-Bjorn “Tobi” Fjellner)](https://wordpress.org/support/users/tobifjellner/)
 * Last activity: [9 years, 1 month ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/confusing-string-composition/)
 * Status: not a support question