Alconost Blog

Multilingual localization of the Clue application — Alconost

Written by Nick Zaleski | 9/18/20 9:40 AM

Clue is an app for tracking menstrual cycles that is available on iPhone and Android.

Clue stands out among the hundreds of other dedicated mobile apps not only thanks to its design (which foregoes the typical pink theme), but also its functionality:

  • Useful personal diary: beyond allowing you to record the start of your cycle, the app allows you to note additional information about how you feel, including your mood, so that you can find out more about your body;

  • High prediction accuracy: the program uses data about each cycle to continuously improve the accuracy of its predictions about when the next cycle will begin, PMS, and the days on which you are most likely to become pregnant. Prediction can be even further refined using the additional data that is entered from the personal diary;

  • Convenient notifications: so that the beginning of your cycle will not take you by surprise, you will be able to take contraceptives on time, or, if you are trying to get pregnant, so that you do not miss the most favorable days for conceiving;

  • An abundance of simple and relevant background information; if you wonder why all the app's functionality is useful, Clue would be be happy to explain everything: its explanations are more understandable than scientific articles and more concise than Wikipedia.

In general, the product turned out to be so good and became so popular that it would have been unfair to restrict users to only the English-language version.

Clue had worked with Crowdin in the past. It had come to fully appreciate the convenience of the multipurpose cloud platform. That is where they met Alconost, which offered specialized localization solutions.

The project was complicated: it involved a narrow range of subject-specific terminology, scientific fact checking, and the need to maintain the app's simplicity and ease of presentation, including when the app is updated. Alconost accepted the challenge, inviting only those translators to work on project with knowledge of the subject area and experience in app localization for each language.

Alconost first localized the app into French. Clue checked the quality of Alconost's translations with a third party. After they received confirmation that the work was high quality, they launched a full-scale localization project using the Alconost + Crowdin platform.

Alconost's task was to quickly localize the app as well as to translate any subsequent updates into the following 9 languages:

  • French

  • Danish

  • German

  • Spanish

  • Italian

  • Brazilian Portuguese

  • + 3 additional languages that are yet to be announced.

In addition to a team of competent translators, a team of qualified editors has also been working on the project. They have been ensuring that the localization of the app into each of the languages is performed to quality standards.

It is thanks to the capabilities of the Crowdin platform that it has been possible to perform the translations simultaneously and rapidly:

  • The rapid notifications, which inform translators when there are new strings to translate, save a lot of time, making it easy to allocate work between project managers, translators, and editors;

  • A glossary of terms that can be conveniently integrated into the translator workspace. It helps to avoid wasting efforts on harmonizing terminology and maintaining the consistency of translations;

  • App screenshots, which Clue provided with each assignment of new lines. These helped the translators to quickly grasp the context without having to waste time installing the app on their devices, searching the Internet for screenshots, or asking the project manager questions.

We, the team here at Alconost, are delighted to be participating on this project, which does a lot to help women in their everyday lives and certainly makes the world a better place. We wish the product the best of success!

«The ability to order services from Alconost on the Crowdin platform allows us to localize strings as major updates for our application are released, because I'm confident of the quality and reliability of the translations. I appreciate how contactable your team is, both in terms of the entire process and the specific solutions for localization

Liza

Chief marketing specialist at Clue

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