Published: June 10, 2024  Updated: June 20, 2025

Unlocking Global Productivity: The MAPCON Approach to Multilingual CMMS

Introducing Multilingual CMMS Solutions

In today's interconnected industrial landscape, many organizations operate with diverse workforces. A Computerized Maintenance Management System (CMMS) brings order to assets, inventory, preventive maintenance, work orders, purchasing, human resources, and barcoding. But what happens when your skilled maintenance technicians or other system users speak languages other than English?

This scenario often presents a challenge to achieving peak productivity. MAPCON understands this hurdle and offers a sophisticated foreign language conversion process for its world-class CMMS. Our goal is to ensure every team member works efficiently, regardless of their native tongue.

The Conversion Process: From English to Spanish, French, Portuguese, Polish, and Hungarian

Converting a comprehensive CMMS to different languages requires a thoughtful, methodical approach. Our development team undertakes a precise process that addresses every facet of the system. This includes translating labels on windows, menus, help messages, buttons, hover help, dropdowns, and even images.

The initial phase often involves leveraging powerful tools, including Google API, to handle the bulk of the translation work for standard text elements. Following this automated step, a critical manual review and redesign phase commences. Many words in non-English languages feature more characters than their English counterparts. This necessitates careful screen adjustments to ensure correct display and readability. While not every screen requires an update, our programmers diligently review each one for every language. This meticulous, albeit time-consuming, process guarantees a polished and functional user interface. Once the translations and design adjustments are complete, the system integrates the language platforms, making them ready for user selection.

User-Specific Language Preferences

A key advantage of the MAPCON CMMS regarding language conversion lies in its adaptability. Unlike systems where one language choice applies globally, MAPCON offers individual user language preferences. This means that if one user prefers English and another French, the system displays the appropriate language for each person upon his/her login. Users can set their own language choices, or an administrator with appropriate access can assign a language during user account creation or modification. Once logged in, the system recognizes the user's language choice and presents the corresponding menus, windows, and messages.

It is important to note that the system translates the CMMS interface itself, not the data input into fields. For instance, while a "Description" window title might display as "Descrição" in Portuguese, the actual description, such as "Belt – Fan Belt, six inches," remains in the language it was originally entered. This distinction helps maintain data consistency across a diverse user base.

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Administering Language Settings and Display

Administrators hold the key to managing language options within MAPCON. First, an admin specifies the supported languages available to users and designates a default language. This configuration occurs within the system profile's languages tab. Subsequently, admins can either set the language for individual users via their user account window or allow each user to select their preference from the user preferences window. This flexibility provides organizations control while still offering users autonomy.

Menu and Tab Adjustments

The MAPCON system efficiently handles the dynamic nature of multilingual content. The system auto-adjusts spacing for menus and messages, accommodating varying word lengths. For windows, each one receives a specific design tailored to its respective language. The system simply loads the appropriate text based on the user’s language choice, ensuring a seamless visual experience.

Navigating Linguistic Nuances

Translating a complex system requires attention to linguistic rules and specific terminology. Our programmers tackle challenges such as Spanish noun-adjective order by employing a blend of automated tools and manual refinement. While online translation sites, including Google's offerings, play a significant role, the invaluable input of a dedicated person fluent in a particular language makes a substantial difference.

Abbreviations, common in maintenance, also demand precise translation. Terms like "Cd" (calendar day), "WO" (work order), and "PO" (purchase order) undergo manual translation in most cases. This manual touch extends to other specialized maintenance-related terminology, ensuring accuracy and clarity for users worldwide.

Timeframes and Future Horizons

The complete conversion process, combining generated translations and manual adjustments, generally takes approximately one month. This timeframe varies based on the complexity of the CMMS, including the number of screens, tabs, and menus that need translation.

Regarding more conceptual translations, such as recognizing "Main tab" as the "Create New Record area," our approach balances literal translation with functional understanding. While Google Translate provides a strong foundation, the increasing sophistication of AI-written text holds promise for future conversions, offering alternative approaches to address such nuanced linguistic challenges.

It remains important to remember that while many industries share a core set of CMMS functions, operations, and terminology can differ. System users will familiarize themselves with common terminology and the specific meanings of different menus and tabs within their company's context.

Partner with MAPCON for Your Multilingual CMMS Needs

MAPCON Technologies continuously works to enhance its world-class CMMS, aiming to serve more companies across the globe. Our foreign language platform, a relatively recent addition, holds immense potential for expansion into additional languages and broader usage. If you are looking to invest in a company that offers comprehensive translations for Spanish, French, Portuguese, Polish, and Hungarian, MAPCON is your ideal partner. Contact us today at 800-922-4336 to discuss how MAPCON can elevate your global maintenance operations.