Blog

11/08/2026 – Estimated Reading time: 6 minutos

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Introduction

My Name is Jose Pablo Raygada, and this is my final report for the WPCredits course. During this project, I had the opportunity to learn more about the WordPress open-source community and enviroment to contribute to a real WordPress team.

For my project, I decided to work with the Polyglots team, where I was able to contribute by reviewing and translating WordPress strings from English into spanish from Costa Rica.

In this port, I’ll summarize my experience during the course, including my contributions, the challenges that I faced, the resources that I used, and the man skills and lessons I gained throughout the project.

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Teams and Projects I Contributed To

Team: WordPress Polyglots

My choice was based on personal experience with translations and since I’m passionate about the english language. Additionally, I felt that the Polyglots team combines, techonlogy, language, research and attention to detail.

The main purpose of this team is to help make WordPress and its content avilable in different languages and regions around the world.

My contribution focused on translating and localizing WordPress strings from English for Costa Rica. My goal was not only to translate the original meaning, but also to make each translation sound natural and appropiate for users in Costa Rica and Spanish speaking readers, while following the terminology and guidlines used by the WordPress community.

This process provided me with a sense of accomplishment. Is very rewarding for one’s work to help other people and make useful content more accesible to other people.

During the project, I reviewed 110 strings and submitted a total of 161 translation proposals.

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Learning and Resources

Before submitting my first translations, I spent time learning how the Polyglots team works and understanding the translation process.

Some of the main resources I used were:

1. The WordPress Polyglots documentation and contributor information.

2. The Translate WordPress platform.

3. The Spanish (Costa Rica) translation glossary and guidelines.

4. Previously approved translations from Costa Rica and other Spanish locales.

5. WordPress Slack and the communication channels available to contributors.

These resources were especially useful when a string had little context or when I was unsure about the correct terminology. Looking at previously approved translations also helped me understand the style and consistency expected by the community.

This process also helped me improve my translation skills as I realized that some of my inputs were too literal or did not follow the guidelines. Additionally, this exposure to new words and terms greatly improved my vocabulary.

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Challenges and Solutions

One of the main challenges was translating strings with very little context. A short word or phrase can have different meanings depending on whether it appears as a button, title, setting, or instruction. To solve this, I reviewed the available context and compared the string with similar translations that had already been approved.

Another challenge was working with technical elements such as placeholders, percentages, HTML tags, and variables. These elements cannot always be modified because they may affect the documentation. I learned to identify these elements and reorganize the Spanish sentence around them without changing their original meaning, which was challenging.

A third challenge was maintaining consistency with the Spanish (Costa Rica) translation guidelines. I learned that my experience with some terminology could not be applied to some sections of this project. To improve this, I worked on using the glossary more foten and rviwed approved translations before submitting new proposals.

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My Contributions

My main contribution to WordPress was translating and reviewing strings for the Spanish (Costa Rica) locale.

By the end of the project, my results were:

– Strings reviewed: 110
– Translation proposals submitted: 161
– Approved proposals: 110
– Pending proposals: 51
– Total time invested: 20 hours
– Portfolio entries published: 8

Some of my translations required more research than others, especially strings containing technical terminology or limited context. Throughout the project, I documented my progress and kept evidence of my translation activity.

Contribution links:

[Translation of 5.1.x: Spanish (Costa Rica)]

[Translation of 6.9.x: Spanish (Costa Rica)]

Evidence:

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Ley Learnings from the WPCredits Course

One of the most important things I learned from WPCredits is that contributing to an open-source project involves more than completing a technical task. Contributors need to follow community guidelines, communicate with others, accept feedback, and understand that their work becomes part of a much larger project, our contributions won’t be forgotten.

I also learned that translation and localization are not the same as simply replacing words from one language with words from another. A good translation needs to consider context, consistency, regional terminology, and the experience of the person using the software. There’s so much more that comes into it than I thought.

Another important lesson was the value of patience and collaboration. Some contributions require review from other community members, so feedback and approval may take time

The course also helped me better understand how the WordPress community works. Before WPCredits, I mainly knew WordPress as a platform for creating websites. Now I understand that it is also an open-source project supported by contributors working in many different areas that all come together to achieve great results.

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New Skills acquired

Through this project, I developed both technical and soft skills.

Technical skills:

– Using the Translate WordPress platform.
– Understanding the basic WordPress translation workflow.
– Working with translation placeholders, variables, and HTML elements.
– Applying localization guidelines for Spanish (Costa Rica).
– Using glossaries and previously approved translations to maintain consistency.
– Identifying the importance of context when translating software interfaces.

Soft skills:

– Attention to detail.
– Time management.
– Research and problem-solving.
– Following community guidelines.
– Receiving feedback and using it to improve future contributions.

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Personal Reflection and Next Steps

Overall, WPCredits was a different experience from the projects I usually complete in a university course because my work was submitted to a real open-source community.

At the beginning of the project, the WordPress contribution process was unfamiliar to me. I needed time to understand the platform, the Polyglots team, and the translation guidelines. After completing several contributions, however, the process became much more familiar.

One of the things that surprised me the most was the amount of detail involved in translating software. Even a very short string can require research to determine its context and the most appropriate translation.

I am satisfied with the progress I made during the course, especially seeing that 110 of my translation proposals were approved. More importantly, I now have a better understanding of how people can contribute to open-source projects even without directly programming new features.

In the future, I would like to continue applying what I learned about localization, collaboration, and open-source communities. I also plan to keep my WordPress profile and this portfolio as a record of my first experience contributing to an open-source project.

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