Blend CKEditor 5 Collaboration Features with your application: translations and custom balloons for comments and track changes arrive
We are happy to announce the release of CKEditor 5 Collaboration Features v19.0.1. This version further improves the customization options of comments and track changes annotations. It also introduces the possibility to localize collaboration features and add custom translations. Read on for more information!
# Custom annotation views
We are aware that in order for collaboration features to truly become a part of your application, they need to be flexible as well as easy to customize and extend. This is why in this release we have introduced a series of improvements in collaboration features API that will allow you to customize comment and suggestion balloons — the ones that you see in the sidebar or inline, if you use inline annotations display mode.
The new possibilities include:
- Extending the default view with new UI elements.
- Creating your own features connected with the annotation balloons.
- Providing a completely custom view with your own template, styling, and behavior.
Thanks to this, it will be much easier to seamlessly integrate both comments and track changes with the look and feel of your application.
As always, we bring you detailed documentation on this subject as well as examples of use.
# Localization of collaboration features
In this release, we have implemented localization mechanisms in the UI of all CKEditor 5 Collaboration Features.
The image below features the editor with collaboration features localized into Polish:
Thanks to the recent improvements in the translation system of CKEditor 5, collaboration features will now offer a much smoother experience if your application uses the editor in a language other than English.
On top of that, we have also introduced support for plural forms in our translation mechanism. You can take advantage of it if your language has more complex pluralization rules.
Please remember that internationalization is a community-driven project. It takes place on Transifex and we rely on volunteers to provide translations for the user interface of the editor and all its features. We would like to take this occasion to encourage everyone willing to help to take part in the project and thank those who have already participated!
If translations for your language are not available in the official release yet, you can still provide them on your own, in the code, together with your CKEditor 5 build. You can also override the existing translations if you need to, for example, preserve consistency with the rest of your application.
# Tailor-made collaboration
Recently, we have seen a growing interest in the customization of CKEditor 5 collaboration features. From custom themes and templates for annotation balloons through introducing a common sidebar for comments added to multiple editors or even non-editor elements of your application, to adding new features for comment threads or user presence list — all these changes allow you to make collaboration features a deeply-rooted part of your software.
To try it out, you can check out multiple demos of CKEditor 5 collaboration features, including a new sample that implements comments added to editor and non-editor fields, displayed in a common sidebar.
All products from CKEditor 5 Ecosystem are known to be easy to customize and extend. We expect no less out of our collaboration solutions. With this release, we are happy to provide you with even more tools that will help you create a smooth blend of our software and your application.
We hope that you will like the recent changes in collaboration features and that you will soon make good use of them, creating a unique user experience for your users. We are always open to hearing your feedback, so do not hesitate to contact us with any questions or ideas for further improvements!
# Other improvements
In this release, we have also addressed some issues. See the changelog for the full list of changes.
# What’s next?
In the next iterations, we will focus on the stability of the collaboration features, mainly in regards to the new comments API. In addition to this, we will be working on integrating the recent table selection improvements of CKEditor 5 with collaboration features.
Do not forget to check out what cool new features we have introduced in CKEditor 5 in this release and stay tuned for the upcoming releases!