Languages

Job Radar keeps every user-visible text in messages/<id>.json, one file per interface language (English and Chinese ship with it). Which language is used where is set in language.yaml (Settings → Interface → Languages).

language.yaml

Key	Default	Meaning
ui.default_locale	en	Interface language of a browser that never picked one. The language button in the top bar remembers a choice per browser (cookie). Must be one of the messages files.
ai.output	en	The language of everything the AI writes: fit reasons, gaps, the one-line summary, the job breakdown, suggestion reasons. Any language code (en, zh, de, fr, pt-BR …).
ai.summary_also	[]	The one-line summary is also written in these languages, so another interface language still shows one.
translation.target	en	Job ads are translated into this language. Ads already written in it get no translation tab and no translate button, and the automatic translation skips them.
notify.locale	null	Language of Telegram messages, buttons and alerts; null = ui.default_locale.
cli.locale	null	Language of pnpm run doctor and pnpm sources:list; null = ui.default_locale. Both commands also take `–lang en

Language codes are BCP 47 tags (en, zh, de, pt-BR, zh-Hant); an invalid one is refused when saving and by pnpm config:check.

An install from before languages were configurable gets a language.yaml written on its first start with what it did until then: Chinese interface, AI texts, Telegram and command line, English one-line summaries next to the Chinese ones, translations into Chinese. A new install gets the English defaults above.

What changes when you change a language

• Interface: at the next page load (the web app reads language.yaml fresh). A browser that picked a language with the button keeps it.
• AI output: new results are written in the new language. Earlier scores, breakdowns and suggestions are not rewritten (that would cost an AI call per job): they keep their language, and the job page marks text that is not in the interface language with a small language tag (for example 中文) and the right lang attribute. Nothing is translated automatically.
• Translation target: translations are stored per language, so switching back shows the earlier ones again.
• Telegram / command line: the next message or run.

The one-line summary shown is the one in the interface language, else in the AI output language, else English, else any language there is; a summary in another language than the interface carries a language tag.

Command-line output

• User commands follow cli.locale (or --lang): pnpm run doctor, pnpm sources:list, pnpm traps:scan, and the Telegram test message of pnpm telegram:test (Telegram language). Their --json output carries codes only (ids, statuses, reason keys); the doctor’s JSON also says which locale its texts are in.
• Developer and maintenance commands (config:check, *:migrate, db:*, smoke:*, score:*, simhash:*, auth:linkedin, the e2e tools, logs) are in English.

Adding an interface language

1. Copy messages/en.json to messages/<id>.json (for example fr.json; the file name is the language code).
2. Fill in meta: name (the language’s own name, shown in the language menu), intl (the tag for dates and numbers, fr-FR), promptName (how a prompt names the language to an AI, French), wide (true for CJK scripts). Translate format (relative times, duration units, salary words) and as many other keys as you like: a key that is missing shows the English text.
3. Run pnpm i18n:catalog (it also runs before pnpm dev, pnpm build and pnpm build:runner) and commit the regenerated src/i18n/catalog.generated.ts and src/i18n/messages.generated.ts. pnpm i18n:check (part of scripts/validate.sh and CI) fails when a messages file is invalid or the generated files are stale.

No hand-written code changes. With more than two languages the language button becomes a menu that lists every language by its own name. Rules the check enforces: English and Chinese have every key; other languages have no key English lacks; every message uses the same ICU placeholders as the English one; meta is valid.

For contributors

• User-visible text goes into messages/*.json, never into components, Telegram messages, doctor checks or CLI output meant for users. tests/i18n/no-hardcoded-cjk.test.ts scans every string literal and JSX text of src/ and scripts/ for Han characters (comments are fine); the allow-list holds only demo data and migration templates.
• Outside React, use translatorFor(locale, namespace) or getTranslator(namespace, "notify" | "cli") from src/lib/i18n/node.ts; Telegram formatting gets a NotifyText, doctor checks use ctx.t.
• Format numbers, times and salaries only through src/lib/format/* with an explicit locale.