Translating Articles with Bulk Translate

Bulk Translate allows you to translate multiple articles from the Articles page in bulk. 

You also have the option to translate all or specific parts of an individual article within the Article View, so you can manage translation tasks at scale. Refer to Translating All or Part of an Individual Article for more details about that. 

For an overview of Translate, refer to Using Translate. 

In this Article
Translating Articles with Bulk Translate
    Source
        Source help center language
        Translation Settings
    Destination
        Articles or Images
        Help Center Translation
        Keep source language        
        Keep the previous images in the translation
        Translate Images
        Re-translating all images
        Right-to-left languages (Hebrew)
        Save translations locally for review
        Save translations as draft in Intercom
        Overwrite if a translation already exists
    Running the Translate
Updating Only the Images in Existing Translations
Reviewing the Translations    
    Translations Saved as Draft in Intercom
    Translations Saved Locally for Review
Updating Translations

Translating Articles with Bulk Translate

1. From the Articles page, select one or more articles that you want to translate (refer to Selecting Articles).

2. Click Translate.

   

Source

Source help center language

The Source help center language automatically detects the language of the selected article(s).
If you have selected articles in more than one language, the relevant language codes are shown in the drop-down so you can select the language of the articles you want to translate and this updates the number of articles that will be translated.

Translation Settings

Click Translation Settings to display the Glossary, Translate Text, Translate Images and the Translation Notice. For details, refer to Translation Settings - Glossary, Translate Text, Translate Images, Translation Notice.

• Glossary allows you to control the translations for specific terms and phrases to maintain a specific brand voice or ensure that terms are consistent.
• Translate Text provides the instructions for ChatGPT to translate the article text. This is set initially as the default prompt.
• Translate Images provides the instructions for translating the text inside images, for all languages or for a specific language. Hebrew has built-in instructions that lay out the images right to left.
• Translations Notice can be used to add a disclaimer to articles translated with AI. This text is translated along with your article and inserted at either the beginning or the end of the translated version. You can use HTML to format the text.

Destination

Articles or Images

At the top of the Destination, choose what to translate:

• Articles translates the full article. This is the default and works as described in this article.
• Images updates only the images in translations that already exist, without changing the translated text. Refer to Updating Only the Images in Existing Translations.

Help Center Translation

Select one or more languages that you want to translate to, or Select All languages. The drop-down shows the languages and the Help Center Translation codes.

You can only select languages that you have enabled in your Help Center. 

You can select all or more than one language in order to translate articles to multiple languages in one go. 

Keep source language

Keep source language is used if you want to create copies of the same language but in different locales without translating the text. This is relevant if you have some languages for which there are different flavors. 

Keep the previous images in the translation

If a translation for the selected language already exists, Keep the previous images in the translation  will keep the same images in the new translation as in the previous version. This is useful if you are using different images in the translation to those in the source article. 

Translate Images

Where articles contain images, you can use Bulk Translate to Translate Images. This uses AI to read the text in the images and translates this into the relevant language. This uses the Glossary (see below) and preserves non-text elements such as logos and icons.

Credits for Translate Images are separate to the Translate Credits. To purchase Credits for Translate Images, contact Support using the Live Chat or email support@swifteq.com.

If an image has already been translated and has not changed, the existing translation is reused and does not use a credit again. To translate it again, for example after changing the image instructions, use Re-translating all images.

To update only the images in translations that already exist, without translating the text again, use Images mode. Refer to Updating Only the Images in Existing Translations.

Re-translating all images

When Translate images is selected, you can also select Re-translate all images, including ones already translated. This option is also available in Images mode.

Use this after you change the image translate instructions in the Translation Settings, so that images translated before the change are updated too. Without it, only new or changed images are translated.

Right-to-left languages (Hebrew)

When images are translated into Hebrew, the screenshots are laid out right to left, like a Hebrew user interface: side menus move to the right, rows, columns and tabs read from right to left, and text is right-aligned. Logos, photos, numbers, dates and English product names are kept as they are.

This uses built-in instructions for Hebrew, which you can view and adjust in the Translate Images tab of the Translation Settings. Refer to Changing the Translate Images Instructions.

As with all automatic translations, check a few translated images before translating a large number of articles.

Save translations locally for review

This saves your article translations locally in Swifteq without pushing them to Intercom. This allows the translation to be reviewed and corrected if needed before being saved to Intercom. The article translations are marked as "Under Review".

You can review the translation in the Editor and make any changes then save the translation to Intercom. Refer to Reviewing Automatic Translations.

If you select this option, the following two options for Destination are automatically disabled.

Save translations as draft in Intercom

Save translations as draft in Intercom is initially checkmarked by default. This ensures that the translation is unpublished in Intercom and saved as a "Draft" article so you can manually check and edit it before publishing.

Overwrite if a translation already exists

You can run the Translate with Overwrite if a translation already exists selected.

• If the translation article exists it is overwritten and will keeps the same status. So, if the translation was Published, it is updated and left as Published. If the translation was Draft, it is updated and left as Draft.
• If the translation article does not exist, it will be created and will be automatically set as was Published,
• If you select both Overwrite if a translation already exists and Save translations as draft in Intercom, the translation article will be unpublished so users will NOT have access to it until it has been published from Intercom.
• If the translation article exists, when Save translations as draft in Intercom is selected you need to also checkmark Overwrite if a translation already exists to perform the translation.

Running the Translate

1. Make your selections for Source and Destination.
2. Click Translate.
   
   While the Translate is running you can click Cancel Task to cancel.
   
   
   
   When prompted to confirm, click OK to continue with the Cancel Task, or click Cancel to let the Translate continue.

The Translate function creates the articles which are translations of the original article(s).

The translation is created with the same article settings (such as the settings for "Author") as the original article.

Any attached documents are not translated.

While Translate is running, you cannot run this on any other articles until it has completed.

When the Translate is complete, a message displays. You can click the link to display the translations that have been completed successfully and display these directly from the message.

You will also receive an email with the articles that were successfully translated. 

For published articles, these are clickable links to the articles. For draft articles, this shows the title but the link is not clickable as these articles do not have a public link.

The email also includes links to any articles that could NOT be translated. If any articles could NOT be translated the most likely cause is that the articles selected already have a translation in the same language. In this case, the email shows the title of the article(s) that was being translated (not the title of the translations). 

You can run the Translate on these articles again and checkmark the option Overwrite if a translation already exists option in the Translate dialog to replace the existing translations with a new one.

Updating Only the Images in Existing Translations

Use Images mode when your articles already have translations and you only want to translate or refresh their images, for example after taking new screenshots. The translated title and text are not changed and no Translate Credits are used, only Credits for Translate Images.

1. From the Articles page, select the articles in the source language.
2. Click Translate.
3. In the Destination, click Images.
4. Select one or more languages.
5. If needed, select Re-translate all images, including ones already translated to translate every image again (refer to Re-translating all images).
6. If needed, select Save translations as draft in Intercom.
7. Click Update images.

In Images mode, the dialog shows how many Credits for Translate Images you have left. The following options are hidden because they do not apply: Keep source language, Keep the previous images in the translation, Translate Images (always on in this mode), Auto-translate untranslated collections, Save translations locally for review and Overwrite if a translation already exists (the existing translation is always updated).

How the images are updated

• The images in the source article are translated, and each translated image replaces the image in the same position in the translation.
• Images that are not translated, such as animated GIFs or images without text, keep the image the translation already has.
• The translation keeps its current status: a published translation stays published and a draft stays a draft, unless you select Save translations as draft in Intercom.
• If an image has already been translated and has not changed, it is reused and does not use a credit again, unless you select Re-translate all images, including ones already translated.

Skipped articles

An article is skipped, and nothing is changed, when:

• There is no existing translation in the selected language.
• The translation and the source article have a different number of images.
• The translation has no images to update.
• There are no Credits for Translate Images left.

When the update is complete, a message shows how many images were translated, in how many articles, and how many articles were skipped. Hover over the skipped articles to see the reason for each one. You will also receive an email with the updated and the skipped articles.

Reviewing the Translations

The automatic translations may not be 100% accurate and you should always check the articles as the translation may require some manual editing.

The method for reviewing translations depends on how the options were set for the automatic translation either. Refer to Reviewing Automatic Translations.

Updating Translations

To update translations:

• Changes can be made manually either in Intercom, or in the Help Center Translate Editor.
• In the Help Center Translate Editor, you can translate the entire article(s) again using Bulk Translate as described above. 
  You need to also select Overwrite if a translation already exists. Refer above to Overwrite if a translation already exists.
• You can also display the Translate from the Article View by clicking Translate or Article Translations and either translate the entire article or parts of it (refer to Translating All or Part of an Individual Article). 
• To update only the images in existing translations, use Images mode in Bulk Translate. Refer to Updating Only the Images in Existing Translations.