# How OkCredit uses Philology to experiment with Android strings without releasing a new app version

DevFeed: [How OkCredit uses Philology to experiment with Android strings without releasing a new app version](<https://devfeed.tech/articles/how-okcredit-android-app-improves-ux-writing-by-changing-strings-on-the-fly-and-you-can-too-37401.md>)

Original publisher: [Read original article](<https://medium.com/okcredit/how-okcredit-android-app-improves-ux-writing-by-changing-strings-on-the-fly-and-you-can-too-8f38da8e69b9?source=rss----40ea5327aac7---4>)

Author: Rashanjyot Singh

Published: 2022-07-13T06:31:23Z

Content type: tutorial

Language: en

Sources: [OkCredit - Medium](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/okcredit-medium.md>)

Topics: [Android](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/android.md>), [User experience (UX)](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/ux.md>), [Library](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/library.md>), [Open Source](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/open-source.md>), [Localization (l10n)](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/localization.md>)

Tags: [android](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/android.md>), [android-app-development](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/android-app-development.md>), [android-library](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/android-library.md>), [engineering](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/engineering.md>), [experimentation](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/experimentation.md>), [language](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/language.md>), [mobile-app-development](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/mobile-app-development.md>), [open-source](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/open-source.md>), [ux](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/ux.md>), [ux-writing](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/ux-writing.md>)

## AI overview

This tutorial explains how OkCredit experimented with Android string resources and translations without releasing a new app version, using the open-source Philology library. The article describes the need for faster string experimentation across a multilingual user base and the use of a pilot to assess the approach.

## Source excerpt

How OkCredit Android App improves UX writing by changing strings on the fly (and you can too!)Foreword⚠ First things first! We don't want to make any false claims, and to tell you straight off, you cannot update the strings stored as XML resources in your android app. However, we are here to tell you how we achieved that effect in OkCredit android app by using 'Philology', an open-source android library. OkCredit is a digital ledger app used by millions of small business owners and their customers daily to facilitate the recording of credit/payment transactions digitally all over India. The app supports over 11 different languages and to cater to such a diverse userbase, one key aspect is to communicate effectively. A pain point often shared by our product managers and language localization teams was that each time we wanted to experiment with strings, change/update them or make changes to translations of specific languages, we had to release a new version of the app. Hence, we wanted to have a setup that would enable us to experiment with strings faster and update them on the fly without releasing a new version of the app. Let's Get Started Like most apps, OkCredit app uses a lot of XML string resources, and an ideal implementation to set up string experimentation would be one that requires the bare minimum amount of changes in the way we conventionally fetch strings, which is using getString(...) method of the Resources class. The android developer community is amazing and that's what we realized yet again when we instantly found exactly what we needed. We figured out quite a few technical blogs and a couple of open-source libraries that explained the underlying mechanism well (hence, we won't do that much herein and simply share the relevant links). However, to build conviction that it could run flawlessly at scale, we needed to pilot the solution first-hand. After using it for numerous experiments to improve the experience for millions of our users, with this b