Language and cultural settings on CDPs platform

• Introduction
• Changing languages
• Cultural settings
• Changing cultural settings

Introduction

CDPs platform is available in the following languages: English, Spanish, Portuguese, French (partial), Japanese, Chinese (Simplified) and Korean.

The Online Response System (ORS) is available in all of the same languages for companies and cities. For states and regions, the ORS is available in English, Spanish and Portuguese.

You can choose the language you are seeing your dashboard and the ORS by selecting this from your dashboard once you are signed in. You can also select/change your cultural settings, which numerical settings that vary from country to country. See the section for Changing cultural settings below for more information.

Changing languages

If you wish to change the language in which you see your dashboard and the ORS, you can do this from your dashboard using the Language drop-down. Simply click on the Lanugage drop down menu at the top of the page and select the language you would like to operate in.

Note: you may need to sign out of the ORS, and enter it again from the dashboard, for the change to take effect.

You can continue to answer your questionnaire(s) in English even if you are viewing the questionnaire in another language. From 2023, responses submitted in English, Chinese, Japanese, Portuguese and Spanish will be eligible for scoring provided all other scoring criteria are met.  

To adjust the display of dates, decimal places and thousand separators, please see the section below on Changing your cultural settings.

Cultural settings
Cultural settings allow you to choose how data is formatted and displayed in the Online Response System (ORS). Cultural settings are only applied in the ORS and affect how numbers and dates are displayed to you only.

These settings do not apply to your formatted response or the dates on the dashboard.

In the ORS you will see the following question types adapt to the cultural setting selected.

Date questions

Dates will be displayed in a format specific to the cultural setting selected. The cultural setting determines the order of the days, months and years. You can see the format required in greyed out letters in the answer box before an answer is entered.

For example, the English US versus English UK date format would differ as follows. 

                English US vs. English UK

Numeric questions

Numbers will also be displayed in a format specific to the cultural setting selected. The cultural setting determines which decimal separator or group separator (e.g. thousand separators) is used (i.e. a decimal point or other) and determines which group separator is used (i.e. a comma or other).

For example, the decimal separator for English (UK) is a decimal point, and the group separator is a comma. Two-thousand and a half should be entered and displayed as 2,000.5 

If you change the culture setting to French (France), the decimal separator is a comma, and the group separator is a space.  Two-thousand and a half is displayed as 2 000,5.

You will see the format required in the answer box in greyed out letters before an answer is entered. 

English (US) vs. French (France)

For Portuguese, the thousand separator is a full stop and the decimal separator is a decimal place. Two and a half thousand will be displayed as 2.000,5.
In summary, the number formats will be displayed as follows depending on the language selected:

• English (UK/US): 2,000.5
• French: 2 000.5
• Portuguese: 2.000,5

Changing your cultural settings

You can change your cultural settings on your My account page. This can be found in the drop down menu from your initials icon at the top right of the page when you are signed in.

If you do not select your cultural settings, they default to the language selected and your location. 

To change your cultural settings:

1. Click on My account from the drop down of your initials at the top right of the page. You will need to be signed in
2. Click on the dropdown arrow to see all languages/countries available under Your cultural settings
3. Select the language/country you want to see the ORS. Note, this will change the settings for you only. Any other contributors to the questionnaire  
4. Click on Update details. You will see a red banner message indicating you have been successful

For your cultural settings to update and be reflected in the ORS, you must first exit the ORS, change the selection and enter the ORS again from your dashboard.

Changing your cultural settings will not change your language settings; you can set different language and cultural settings. If you do not make a selection, the default cultural settings will correspond with your language settings. 

For more information on cultural settings including a list of the default settings, a list of the cultural settings available for selection, and the full breakdown of how the cultural settings display in the ORS, see Appendix 1: Cultural settings on page 69 of our comprehensive platform guide. For guidance on how cultural settings behave when exporting responses, see the sections for exporting for Word and Excel on pages 48 to 55 of our platform guide.

You may also find the following articles helpful: 

• New user access
• Activating your organization as an organization
• How to navigate the Online Response System (ORS)
• Submit your response as an organization

If you have not found an answer you were looking for, please contact our support team through My Support. You will need to be signed in to access this. 

If you are a new user, you can register here. Once you are signed in, please return to the Help Center via the link at the top of the page.