Install profile with variable default language messes up translations I'm working on an install profile for a Drupal app that can be delivered in several languages. The app was developed with English as the default language, but some installations might be in Arabic only.

The problem is that Arabic-language installations of this profile show the English menu items, field labels, etc. When I examine the strings in the localization UI, it shows the English string next to the default language, which is now Arabic. Only strings from the "default" textgroup are appearing correctly for some reason.

Now I am aware that there is an issue with default language vs source language in i18n. I would appreciate if someone could offer a workaround for my particular situation.
Turns out to be a simple solution: the variable i18n_string_source_language can be used to specify the source language of all strings, instead of the current site language.

I ended up setting 

$conf['i18n_string_source_language'] = 'en';


in my settings.php. This worked.