Ceum treats two kinds of labels differently: the ones that come with the app — the names of the statuses, task types, and relationship types you get when you first sign up or restore defaults — and the ones you write yourself. They follow different rules, so you can switch languages without losing your customizations, and keep your customizations stable even when the rest of the app changes language.
The rule, in one sentence
Built-in defaults translate when you switch language. Anything you rename or create stays exactly as you wrote it.
What this means in practice
Built-in defaults follow your language
The labels that ship with the app are translated just like the rest of the interface. When you change the app language, every default label follows along:
- The task status "Todo" becomes the chosen language's word for it.
- The task type "Billable" becomes the chosen language's word for it.
- The relationship type "Blocks" becomes the chosen language's word for it.
- The same applies to the starter templates you pick during onboarding: Freelancer and Developer are both fully translated where a translation exists.
You'll see this on kanban column headers, dropdown options in forms, status badges on lists, the onboarding template picker — everywhere a default name appears.
Your own names stay fixed
The moment you rename a default — say you rename the task type "Bug" to "Defect" — Ceum treats that label as yours. It's shown exactly as you typed it in every language. Switching the app to another language won't change it back, and it won't try to translate "Defect" into Finnish.
The same is true for anything you create from scratch under Custom statuses, Task types, or Relationship types. New entries are yours from the start; they're never auto-translated and show the same name no matter the language.
This matches how Ceum handles names everywhere else: your client names, project names, and task names are never auto-translated either.
Why two rules
The split keeps two things working at once:
- Picking up a new language should feel like the app speaks it. If everything stayed in English the moment you signed up, switching to Finnish wouldn't reach the statuses and task types you see most often.
- Renaming should feel permanent. Once you've decided "Bug" should be "Defect" in your account, the app should never quietly undo that — not even for a single session in another language.
To do both, Ceum keeps track of which labels are translations of a shared concept (the defaults) and which are your own text. The line is drawn at the rename: a label is a default until you change it, and yours afterward.
Getting a default translation back
If you renamed a default and want the translated version back, edit that entry and clear the name field — or delete it and use Restore defaults on the relevant settings page to bring the default back exactly as it would have arrived for your current language.
Edge cases worth knowing
- Renaming back to the original English word does not reattach the translation. If you change "Todo" → "Backlog" → "Todo", that final "Todo" is still your text, not the default. To get the translated "Todo" back, restore defaults.
- PDF exports use the stored name. Defaults appear in their English form there, and your custom names appear exactly as you wrote them — what the recipient sees doesn't depend on their language.
- Languages without a translation fall back to English. If you switch to a language that doesn't yet have a translation for a particular default, you'll see the English label rather than a blank. Names you've written yourself are never affected.