Steven Zahm@ boerup
re: The Say What? plugin only changes the backend, right?
No, it changes it everywhere the string is used within Connections. If the template has a shortcode option, it will override any changes made by Say What? OR the shortcode option exists because it is a string is template specific and is needed because Say What would have no effect.
re: So, I would need to use both the Say What? plugin AND short code adjustments, like [connections str_cell_phone='Mobile']. Right?
No, you can simply use Say What? in this case. You only need to use the shortcode in this instance if you want to override the default template text or override the custom string applied Say What? (if one was added).
re: I think it would be a very useful (and pretty standard) adjustment of Connections to make it possible to change the labels easily within the plugin settings.
Sorry, no. This feature will not be added to Connections. And it is not at all standard for a plugin to make all its strings as settings. That would make plugin very bloated and slow.
Ideally if you want labels and such in your preferred language, you would translate those strings in Transifex or do it locally using Poedit. That is the standard method for WordPress, theme and plugins for internationalization and localization.
Templates have shortcode options for their strings because there are strings that are template specific which can not be translated as part of Connections because they are a separate plugin. Adding template and extension specific strings to Connections would only serve to bloat the core Connections plugin. That said… templates some of the templates have been converted to be translation ready so Say What? can be used as well as translation via Poedit. The shortcodes for the template that have been converted are still in place to provide backwards compatibility and still allow the option to change the labels to something other than what was tranlated.
Hope that helps!