tobifjellner (Tor-Bjorn “Tobi” Fjellner) (@tobifjellner) – WordPress user profile

tobifjellner (Tor-Bjorn “Tobi” Fjellner)

@tobifjellner Barcelona, Spain joined Mar 2011

gsm.fjellner.com github.com/tobifjellner Slack: @tobifjellner

Teams Community Polyglots Support

Languages sv_SE fy kir ru_RU en-gb

Bio

Poet, Writer, Project Manager, Mobile Telecom Marketing specialist, Translator, and more… Being Swedish native, I know how to mount furniture from IKEA. 🙂 Oh, and I’m interested in amateur radio, although currently inactive (check your logs from 1980-s for SM0RYB).

The great and versatile tool WordPress can be free thanks to the contributions from thousands of users. And I think it’s great that one can “give back” to WordPress and the community in so many different ways. I’m not a coder (although I may be able to find and fix some small and simple errors in PHP/CSS/JavaScript). But where I really can make a difference, that’s in making WordPress available in Swedish.

Later I even became a global mentor for WordPress translation, so one could say that I support the processes that make WordPress available in more than 70 language versions. Did you know, that 56% (these figures are for June 2023) of all WordPress installations are using a translated version of WordPress? I’m proud to be a part of that!

I was on the organizing team for WordCamp Stockholm 2016, where we successfully introduced the “Micro Sponsor” level for participation.

In June 2023, I was a speaker at WordCamp Europe, with the title: “Enable truly global use of your code – Avoid the typical i18n pitfalls”. It was mainly based on the most important parts of my article about some common i18n-errors developers make: https://gsm.fjellner.com/hints-about-i18n-let-your-code-to-shine-all-over-the-world/

In 2023, I started pursuing ways to drastically improve quality and reuse of content translation for handbooks, documentation, training materials, etc. I’m also on the pilot team for mentoring of new WordPress contributors.

I’d love to contribute more to WordPress, if I just could find the right partners to make it sustainable for me. I want to spend more time on:
– Making it easier for WordPress users to find out about contributing to the project.
– Helping new contributors finding their way in and around the project.
– Re-vitalizing the Swedish community (Yes, I live in Spain, but I’ve got a stable internet connection).
– Encouraging locale teams to publish more relevant content.
– Organizing meetups/WordCamps.
– Smart reuse of translations and content.
– Support for multilingual content in WordPress core.
– … and probably several other things.

Additional links:
– https://facebook.com/fjellner
– https://linkedin.com/in/fjellner
– https://mastodon.social/@tobifjellner

WordPress Origin Story

Ended up with WordPress when I wanted to migrate my blog in Russian about working as an expat in Oman to my own domain and made it a tri-lingual site. Since then I’ve helped lots of friends to get started, too.
When I noted that the themes I loved and some plugins I wanted weren’t available in the languages i needed, I started translating them.
Now I’m one of the global mentors for the WordPress translation efforts and an active participant in the Swedish WordPress community, although I live in Barcelona, Spain.

Since April 2025 I’m sponsored 3 hrs per week by Kinsta. Thank you!
Since March 2026, I’m sponsored another 5 hrs per week by Angry Creative. Thank you!
(Happy to discuss more hours/projects with other companies!)

Badges

CODE

3 badges

Core Contributor '17 Meta Contributor '17 Plugin Developer

CONTENT

1 badge

Photo Contributor '25

COMMUNITY

4 badges

B BuddyPress Contributor '20 Community Contributor '24 WordCamp Organizer '17 WordCamp Speaker '17

PRACTICE

2 badges

Support Contributor '18 Support Team '18

POLYGLOTS

2 badges

Translation Contributor '15 Translation Editor '19

Recent impact

Score weights high-impact work (commits, releases, approved translations, props) at 3x routine activity.

Last 30 days

141contributions

high22

medium119

score185

Last 90 days

337contributions

high63

medium274

score463

Last 12 months

1186contributions

high246

medium940

score1678

Team focus

Share of contributions across teams during the last 365 days

WordPress releases

Contributed to 21 releases

Time commitment

9 hours per week

Angry Creative 5 hrs/wk
Kinsta 3 hrs/wk
On my own time 1 hr/wk

Contributions

Type

June 2026

Jun 11 Thu · 08:04

Meta high

Made 4 updates to handbook pages on Translate WordPress.

Jun 10 Wed · 17:14

Polyglots high

Reviewed 1 string on translate.wordpress.org.

Jun 10 Wed · 17:08

Polyglots high

Translated 8 strings on translate.wordpress.org.

Jun 10 Wed · 14:08

Meta med

Wrote a comment on the post PTE Request for Publirank GEO Ready, on the site Translate WordPress:
Hi @iguanemedia We're still waiting for the #fr_FR team to respond to your post. I…

Jun 10 Wed · 14:04

Meta med

Wrote a comment on the post I’m the author of two…, on the site Translate WordPress:
Hi @slim1167 You made three posts in quick succession, with the same two plugins. I…

Jun 10 Wed · 10:35

Meta med

Wrote a comment on the post PTE Request for WebChatAgent, on the site Translate WordPress:
@webchatagent If you personally don't speak these languages, then PTE is not the right role…

Jun 10 Wed · 08:41

Forums med

Posted a reply to Plug in Admin interface in English?, on the site WordPress.org Forums:
@andersnordh I approved your pending strings. For the initial language pack to get generated, however,…

Jun 10 Wed · 05:10

Meta med

Wrote a comment on the post PTE Request for Product Upload, on the site Translate WordPress:
The key problem is that even if machine translations are getting better and better, someone…

Jun 09 Tue · 21:34

Meta med

Wrote a comment on the post PTE Request for Product Upload, on the site Translate WordPress:
Hi @h1bay1 I've approved the strings you had waiting for #sv_SE. But it's obvious that…

Jun 09 Tue · 19:29

Meta med

Wrote a comment on the post Title: PTE Request for OWH Domain WHOIS RDAP, on the site Translate WordPress:
Hi @linknacional I usually leave at least two weeks for the relevant locale team (or…