| name | translate |
| description | Translate a rendered Q&A card HTML in podcast/notes/ into a target language. Takes a language code argument (e.g. zh, ja, es) and writes to podcast/notes-<lang>/. Preserves template structure and only swaps text content. |
You translate a rendered Q&A card HTML page into a target language.
Goal:
Produce a localized version of an English Q&A card page without touching layout, styles, or markup โ only the text content is translated.
USAGE
/translate <lang> <path-to-source-html>
Example:
/translate zh podcast/notes/lenny-2026-05-03.html
/translate ja podcast/notes/lenny-2026-05-03.html
Where <lang> is an ISO 639-1 code (zh, ja, es, fr, de, ...). For Chinese, default to Simplified (zh โ zh-CN) unless zh-TW is given explicitly.
INPUT
A rendered Q&A card HTML file produced by [[digest]], typically at:
podcast/notes/{channel_slug}-{published_date}.html
OUTPUT FILE
Write the translated HTML to:
podcast/notes-{lang}/{channel_slug}-{published_date}-{lang}.html
Example:
- input โ
podcast/notes/lenny-2026-05-03.html
/translate zh โ podcast/notes-zh/lenny-2026-05-03-zh.html/translate ja โ podcast/notes-ja/lenny-2026-05-03-ja.html
Create the podcast/notes-{lang}/ directory if it does not exist.
Do NOT paste HTML into chat.
The chat response should only say:
Created podcast/notes-{lang}/{filename}
WHAT TO TRANSLATE
Translate the human-readable text content:
<title> and the episode title headingepisode-meta items: source, guest, published date, etc.- The
url_display link text (keep the href URL itself unchanged)
- Each card's question (
.qa-question)
- Each card's one-sentence answer (
.qa-answer)
- Each card's source passage inside
<blockquote>, including speaker labels
WHAT NOT TO TOUCH
- HTML tags, attributes, class names, ids, inline styles
- The template skeleton, CSS, and any
<style> / <script> blocks
href URL values (translate only the visible link text)- Card numbering โ it is CSS-generated, do not write numbers into the HTML
- The
.qa-toggle element โ it stays empty; do not add labels like "ๅๆ็ๆฎต" or "Read transcript"
- Proper nouns and technical terms: never translate or transliterate people names, company names, product names, or technical vocabulary. Keep them verbatim in the source language โ no parenthetical glosses, no romanizations, no native-form substitutions, even when an established translation exists.
- Verified spellings from the English version โ do not re-romanize or re-translate names
LANGUAGE & STYLE
- Use natural, idiomatic phrasing in the target language. Do not translate word-for-word.
- Keep all technical vocabulary verbatim in the source language (e.g.
agency, product-market fit, RAG). Do not translate or gloss it, even on first mention.
- Preserve the speaker's voice in
<blockquote> source passages โ keep them conversational, not formal prose. Do not "clean up" colloquialisms.
- Preserve paragraph breaks and speaker labels inside
<blockquote> (e.g. Host:, Max:) โ translate the label words but keep the structure.
PUBLISHED DATE
Re-render {{published_date}} in a form consistent with the target language:
zh โ 2026 ๅนด 5 ๆ 3 ๆฅja โ 2026ๅนด5ๆ3ๆฅes โ 3 de mayo de 2026fr โ 3 mai 2026de โ 3. Mai 2026- default to the locale's conventional long date form
HTML HEADER
Update the document language attribute:
<html lang="en"> โ <html lang="{lang}"> (use the full tag where appropriate: zh-CN, zh-TW, pt-BR)
Keep the <meta charset="utf-8"> and viewport meta as-is.
QUALITY CHECKS
- Every visible English string is translated; no stray English text remains except intentionally-kept proper nouns and technical terms.
- The translated answer still matches the question (no semantic drift).
- The source passage still supports the answer โ if a translation changes the meaning, re-translate, do not rewrite the answer.
- If the source HTML has an actual error in the English text, translate faithfully first, then append a single translator note at the very end of the page in a
<p class="translator-note">โฆ</p> outside the card list.
