Nuclear powered Raphael Mudge has announced on the After The Deadline blog a couple of interesting developments the first being the removal of API Keys. Using the service no longer requires users to register with the site. However, if you need to use AtD in a commercial environment, you are encouraged to use the open source software edition of AtD. The post covers a couple of other announcements such as an update to the bbPress plugin, AtD speaking more languages and the WordPress plugin now being available in more translations. Seems like every week Raphael has something exciting to tell us regarding AtD which is a good thing!
AtD really is going from strength to strength. The removal of the requirement that you register for an API key makes it even easier to integrate into your site but, for me, the bigger news is that AtD now proofreads 5 languages, with another 4 or 5 in the pipeline.
The current languages are:
English
Spanish
Portuguese
German
French
… which, in terms of native speakers, covers about 1000,000,000 people!
According to a comment on the Atd blog, Raphael is aiming, in this first round, to cover about 90% of WordPress.com users, he figures that the next 4 or 5 will bring him up to that.
This is exciting because the availability of easy proofreading will give far more people the confidence to express their thoughts online. WordPress and online discussion generally are going to be the winners as more people, in more languages, adopt tools such as AtD.
If you want to increase the number of comments your site gets, be sure to integrate AtD and write a post to introduce your users to the idea. If we all work together to make users aware of the option, we will all reap the benefits of more and better comments.
This is great news. Keep and eye out for AEC 4.0 also, which will have After the Deadline built in.
Speaking of multi-language support, I just exchanged a few e-mails with Raphael. It looks like the jQuery API will have to be updated first in order to support multiple languages. So in the meantime, all jQuery API users (including AEC) will have to stick to English.
Raphael has added in a ticket with a high priority for this fix: http://openatd.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/92
AEC + AtD = WIN
@donnacha | WordSkill – I agree, Raphael is doing a great job with AtD and I reiterated this to Matt on episode 88 of WordPress Weekly. Not only can you see his passion for what he does on the AtD blog but also in the work he produces. Great person to be around as well.