Localizing a Covid phone app: A university class experience

In this paper we describe how a COVID-19 phone app was localized by students of the MA program in Translation and Interpreting at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The project presented unique challenges including the urgency and short time-lines, less-than-optimal internationalization of the source code, limitations of the CAT tool, and the use of an open-source platform and crowd-sourced agile development model, in addition to particular linguistic aspects related to the new specialized subject matter, limited string context, and potentially sensitive data. On the other hand, it offered the opportunity to experience a real-life localization project, which had important pedagogical benefits for translation students. These and other aspects are described and suggestions proposed to enable similar projects to run smoothly.