7 community-maintained translations of MDN Web Docs in ES, FR, JA, KO, PT-BR, RU, and ZH, to learn and contribute in your native language.
2k
Stars
8.3k
Forks
393
Open issues
30
Contributors
AI Analysis
The translated-content repository maintains community-driven translations of MDN Web Docs across seven active locales (Spanish, French, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese-BR, Russian, and Simplified/Traditional Chinese). It serves as the primary resource for web developers and learners who prefer to access Mozilla's comprehensive web platform documentation in their native language. This project benefits both contributors who maintain translations and end users seeking localized technical documentat...
Inferred from signals mentioned in the README (tests, CI, type safety) — not a review of the actual code.
AI's overall editorial judgment — not an average of the bars above, can weigh other factors too.
Community-maintained translations of MDN Web Docs in 7 languages, driven by volunteer localization teams
translated-content is a distributed system for maintaining localized versions of MDN Web Docs across French, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese (BR), Russian, Chinese, and Spanish. It exists as a separate repository from the English source content, coordinated by language-specific peer review teams. It serves non-English developers seeking authoritative reference material in their native language and enables volunteer translators to contribute at scale. Adoption is substantial within non-English developer communities but remains specialized and largely invisible to English-dominant ecosystems.
Created December 2020, translated-content formalized MDN's existing localization efforts into a structured community project. It separated translation work from the main English content repository to allow independent contribution workflows while maintaining synchronization with upstream source changes.
The project grew from 0 to 2,006 stars over ~5.5 years through sustained volunteer engagement in established language communities. The 8,324 forks reflect high participation in translation work (typical for distributed content projects), while the modest 5-star gain in the last 7 days suggests stable but not rapidly accelerating adoption. Growth appears driven by translator onboarding in specific locales rather than expansion into new languages—the active locale list has remained stable since inception.
Adoption not verified through quantitative metrics in repository metadata. However, the existence of 7 actively maintained locales with dedicated peer teams, 8,324 forks, and continuous push activity (one day before evaluation) indicates material real-world use by translator communities. MDN's role as the primary web platform reference suggests the translated content reaches substantial non-English developer audiences, but direct end-user adoption metrics are absent from this repository.
Based on README, the project uses a locale-based directory structure with language-specific peer teams managing review and approval. Coordination appears to occur through GitHub labels (l10n-fr, l10n-ja, etc.) and external communication channels. Likely implements a fork-and-PR model for contributor onboarding. README does not document synchronization strategy for tracking upstream source changes in the main content repo.
not documented in README
Last push 2026-07-08 (one day before evaluation date) indicates active ongoing work. The presence of formal peer guidelines (PEERS_GUIDELINES.md), Code of Conduct, and structured locale management suggests mature governance. However, README does not publish metrics on PR review time, issue resolution rate, or contributor retention—making velocity assessment difficult beyond 'active'.
ADOPT IF: you maintain web developer documentation for non-English audiences and want a structured, peer-reviewed approach to localization at scale. Contribution to translated-content lets you leverage Mozilla's infrastructure and peer network. AVOID IF: you require real-time synchronization between source and translation (content delays are inherent to volunteer-driven localization). MONITOR IF: you are a translation community leader in one of the 7 active locales—the project's slow growth suggests you may need to validate whether volunteer availability justifies continued investment versus investing in commercial translation services.
Independent dimensions
Mainstream potential
3/10
Technical importance
5/10
Adoption evidence
6/10
- Translation lag: README does not document how source changes in mdn/content are tracked and propagated to translations. Volunteer-maintained locales may fall significantly behind the English source.
- Volunteer dependency: no documented incentive structure, stipends, or retention programs. Volunteer burnout or team turnover in any locale could stall that language indefinitely.
- Inactive locale revival: the project explicitly rejects contributions to inactive locales (those without active peer teams). No documented pathway to reactivate dormant languages.
- Synchronization complexity: maintaining consistency between 7 language forks of a rapidly evolving reference site is engineering-intensive; README does not describe tooling or automation to manage this.
- Governance opacity: while peer guidelines exist, the decision-making process for locale activation, content prioritization, and conflict resolution is not documented in the README.
Translated-content will likely remain a stable but slow-growing satellite project within the MDN ecosystem. Growth will continue in established locales (FR, JA, ZH) where developer communities are large and translator reserves are deeper; smaller locales (RU, ES) may face retention challenges. No expansion into new languages is evident. Mainstream relevance outside non-English developer communities will remain limited.
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Languages
Information
- Language
- Markdown
- License
- NOASSERTION
- Last updated
- 2d ago
- Created
- 68mo ago
- Analyzed with
- anthropic/claude-haiku-4-5
Stars over time
Contributors over time
Top 100 contributors only — repos with more will plateau at 100.
Open issues
No open issues — clean slate.
Open pull requests
Translate (pt-br): introduction workers
[pt-br] Updating translation and fixing previous untranslated content "Learn/CSS/CSS_layout/Responsive_Design"
[pt-br] Translate Object Oriented Programming "Learn/JavaScript/Objects/Object-oriented_programming"
Top contributors
Recent releases
No releases published yet.
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Translated-content is dependent on content's upstream updates; it is not a competitor but a satellite project. Content has 10,855 stars (5.4× translated-content) and drives the reference material; translated-content replicates and localizes it.
GitHub's documentation is maintained in English with some community translation efforts, but lacks translated-content's formal locale-specific peer structure. GitHub docs focuses on GitHub products; MDN serves the entire web platform.
Cloudflare documentation (4,909 stars) covers Cloudflare-specific material rather than general web standards. Not directly comparable; serves a narrower product scope.
Translated-content differs by being formally part of Mozilla's MDN project with peer review gates, rather than independent fan translations. This provides authority but requires Mozilla alignment.
Translated-content competes for mindshare with locale-specific alternatives (e.g., Python docs in Portuguese, React docs in Chinese). Its advantage is comprehensiveness; disadvantage is synchronization lag with English source.