Internationalization

Internationalization (i18n) in Thulite is powered by Hugo’s multilingual mode.

Quick setup#

1. Enable multilingual mode in your Doks config.
2. Define the default language and each supported language in your config.
3. Create language-specific content folders and matching translated pages.
4. Add translated UI strings and per-language menus if needed.

Enable multilingual mode#

In config/_default/params.toml, turn on the Doks multilingual settings:

[doks]
  multilingualMode = true
  showMissingLanguages = true

Then configure the default language in config/_default/hugo.toml:

defaultContentLanguage = "en"
disableLanguages = []
defaultContentLanguageInSubdir = false

Configure languages#

In config/_default/languages.toml, add one block per language:

[en]
  contentDir = "content/en"
  languageCode = "en-US"
  languageName = "English"
  weight = 10

[de]
  contentDir = "content/de"
  languageCode = "de-DE"
  languageName = "Deutsch"
  weight = 20

[nl]
  contentDir = "content/nl"
  languageCode = "nl-NL"
  languageName = "Nederlands"
  weight = 30

contentDir tells Hugo where to look for that language’s pages. This is the key setting for keeping each language isolated.

Use language-specific content directories#

Keep the same relative path for each translation:

• English: content/en/docs/getting-started.md
• German: content/de/docs/getting-started.md
• Dutch: content/nl/docs/getting-started.md

This keeps URLs and page structure aligned across translations.

Mount content by language#

If you use separate content folders with Doks, mount each folder into Hugo’s content tree:

[[mounts]]
  source = "content/en"
  target = "content"
  lang = "en"

[[mounts]]
  source = "content/de"
  target = "content"
  lang = "de"

[[mounts]]
  source = "content/nl"
  target = "content"
  lang = "nl"

This is especially useful when you want each language to share the same site structure while keeping content separate.

Translate interface strings#

Store shared UI translations in i18n files, such as:

• i18n/en.toml
• i18n/de.toml
• i18n/nl.toml

Example:

[read_more]
other = "Read more"

Use Hugo’s i18n function in templates to render the correct language string.

Optional: fill missing translations#

If one language is incomplete, you can reuse content from the default language:

[[mounts]]
  source = "content/en"
  target = "content"
  lang = "de"

This lets a translated site fall back to the default language for pages that are not yet available.

Per-language menus#

If your site has different navigation, create menu files like:

• config/_default/menus/menus.en.toml
• config/_default/menus/menus.de.toml
• config/_default/menus/menus.nl.toml

This keeps menu labels and links aligned with each language.

Learn more#