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localize

The node-localize library

provides a GNU gettext-inspired (but not conformant) translation utility for Node.js that tries to avoid some of the limitations of the sprintf-bound gettext (such as translation string parameters being in a fixed order in all translation results) and "fit in" better than a straight port.

Installation

If you have npm, just type:

npm install localize

Usage

node-localize returns an object constructor so multiple simultaneous localization objects may be in use at once (though most cases will probably be a singleton instantiation). The only required parameter on initialization is a translations object, using the following structure:

var Localize = require('localize');
 
var myLocalize = new Localize({
    "Testing...": {
        "es": "Pruebas...",
        "sr": "тестирање..."
    },
    "Substitution: $[1]": {
        "es": "Sustitución: $[1]",
        "sr": "замена: $[1]"
    }
});
 
console.log(myLocalize.translate("Testing...")); // Testing...
console.log(myLocalize.translate("Substitution: $[1]", 5)); // Substitution: 5
 
myLocalize.setLocale("es");
console.log(myLocalize.translate("Testing...")); // Pruebas...
 
myLocalize.setLocale("sr");
console.log(myLocalize.translate("Substitution: $[1]", 5)); // замена: 5

node-localize objects can also be passed a string indicating the directory a translations.json file can be found. This directory is searched recursively for all translations.json files in all subdirectories, and their contents combined together, so you can organize your translations as you wish.

The directory is also searched recursively for directories named translations. These directories are checked for special text files of the form varname.txt, varname.es.txt, varname.sr.txt, etc. The text in varname.txt is treated as the default language of the application and the varname.xx.txt are treated as translations of the text. A special strings object is created where the varname becomes a property of that object and the default language text is the value of the property. So you can also do the following:

var Localize = require('localize');
 
var myLocalize = new Localize('./path/to/text/files/');
 
console.log(myLocalize.translate(myLocalize.strings.reallyLongText); // The contents of ./path/to/text/files/translations/reallyLongText.txt, if it exists
 
myLocalize.setLocale("es");
console.log(myLocalize.translate(myLocalize.strings.reallyLongText); // The contents of ./path/to/text/files/translations/reallyLongText.es.txt, if it exists

Dates

Because date formats differ so wildly in different languages and these differences cannot be solved via simple substitution, there is also a localDate method for translating these values.

var theDate = new Date("4-Jul-1776");
var dateLocalize = new Localize("./translations");
dateLocalize.loadDateFormats({
    "es": {
        dayNames: [
            'Dom', 'Lun', 'Mar', 'Mié', 'Jue', 'Vie', 'Sáb',
            'Domingo', 'Lunes', 'Martes', 'Miércoles', 'Jueves', 'Viernes', 'Sábado'
        ],
        monthNames: [
            'Ene', 'Feb', 'Mar', 'Abr', 'May', 'Jun', 'Jul', 'Ago', 'Sep', 'Oct', 'Nov', 'Dic',
            'Enero', 'Febrero', 'Marzo', 'Abril', 'Mayo', 'Junio', 'Julio', 'Agosto', 'Septiembre', 'Octubre', 'Noviembre', 'Diciembre'
        ],
        masks: {
            "default": "dddd, d 'de' mmmm yyyy"
        }
    }
});
 
console.log(dateLocalize.localDate(theDate)); // Thu Jul 04 1776 00:00:00
console.log(dateLocalize.localDate(theDate, "fullDate")); // Thursday, July 4, 1776
console.log(dateLocalize.localDate(theDate, "mm/dd/yyyy")); // 07/04/1776
 
dateLocalize.setLocale("es");
console.log(dateLocalize.localDate(theDate)); // Jueves, 4 de Julio 1776

The date formatting rules and configuration have been taken from node-dateformat, which has been extended to support multiple simultaneous locales and subsumed into node-localize.

Complete API

var myLocalize = new Localize(translationsObjOrStr, dateFormatObj, defaultLocaleStr);
// translationsObjOrStr: a conformant translations object or a string indicating
//     the directory where one or more conformant translations.json files are stored
// dateFormatObj: a conformant date format object, containing one or more locales
//     if not specified, will auto-generate an 'en' locale; if initially specified,
//     will *overwrite* this auto-generated locale object
// defaultLocale: the locale of all keys in the translations object. Defaults to 'en'

myLocalize.setLocale(localeStr);
// localeStr: a locale string to switch to

myLocalize.loadTranslations(translationsObjOrStr);
// translationsObjOrStr: a conformant translations object or a string indicating
//     the directory where one or more conformant translations.json files are stored
//     Multiple calls to loadTranslations *appends* the keys to the translations
//     object in memory (overwriting duplicate keys).

myLocalize.getTranslations(translationsArrOrUndef);
// translationsArrOrUndef: an array of untranslated text whose translations you want
// to acquire, or leave it undefined for the entire internal translations object

myLocalize.clearTranslations();
// Wipes out the translations object entirely (if a clean reload is desired)

myLocalize.throwOnMissingTranslation(throwBool);
// throwBool: Boolean indicating whether or not missing translations should
//     throw an error or be silently ignored and the text stay in the default
//     locale. Useful for development to turn off.

myLocalize.translate(translateStr, arg1, arg2, ...);
// translateStr: The string to be translated and optionally perform a
//     substitution of specified args into. Arguments are specified in a RegExp
//     style by number starting with 1 (it is the first argument that can be
//     used and also is the arguments[1] value...), while using a jQuery-style
//     demarcation of $[x], where x is the argument number.

myLocalize.loadDateFormats(dateFormatObj);
// dateFormatObj: a conformant date format object, containing one or more locales
//     Specified locales are appended to the internal object just like
//     loadTranslations.

myLocalize.getDateFormats();
// Returns the internal date formats object.

myLocalize.clearDateFormats();
// Resets the date formats object to just the 'en' locale.

myLocalize.localDate(dateObjOrStr, maskStr, utcBool)
// dateObjOrStr: the date object or string to format as desired in the current
//     locale.
// maskStr: the predefined mask to use, or a custom mask.
// utcBool: a boolean indicating whether the timezone should be local or UTC

myLocalize.strings
// Object of key-value pairs defined by files in ``translations`` directories
// Key is the filename (sans extension) and value is the default language
// text. Useful for translating very large blocks of text that shouldn't really
// exist in code.

xlocalize CLI Utility

Starting at version 0.2.0, node-localize, when installed via NPM, adds an xlocalize utility command to the PATH, which allows for automatic construction of translations.json files (and can be re-run in the future to update existing files without clobbering any current translations present). It's command switches are as follows:

xlocalize USAGE:

-l	Set the default language for the translations.json file(s) (default: en)
-r	Set xlocalize to generate translations.json files recursively (default)
-R	Set xlocalize to only generate a translations.json file for the current directory
-e	Set the file extensions to include for translation (default: html,js)
-t	Set the languages to translate to (comma separated)
-h	Show this help message.

For example, to create a translations.json file in the current directory only that will translate from English to Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, and French for HTML and JS files:

xlocalize -R -t es,pt,it,fr

And if a new language, such as Serbian, is to be translated at a later time, you can use the command:

xlocalize -R -t es,pt,it,fr,sr

Express Integration Tips

If your website supports multiple languages (probably why you're using this library!), you'll want to translate the page content for each supported language. The following snippets of code should make it easy to use within Express.

Middleware to switch locale on request

app.configure(function() {
    ...
    app.use(function(request, response, next) {
        var lang = request.session.lang || "en";
        localize.setLocale(lang);
        next();
    });
    ...
});

I'm assuming you're storing their language preference inside of a session, but the logic can be easily tweaked for however you detect which language to show.

Export translate, localDate, and strings as static helpers

app.helpers({
    ...
    translate: localize.translate,
    localDate: localize.localDate,
    strings: localize.strings
});

Your controllers shouldn't really even be aware of any localization issues; the views should be doing that, so this ought to be enough configuration within your app.js file.

Using translate, localDate, and strings in your views

<h1>${translate("My Awesome Webpage")}</h1>
 
<h2>${translate("By: $[1]", webpageAuthor)}</h2>
 
<h3>${translate("Published: $[1]", localDate(publicationDate))}</h3>
 
{{if translate(strings.reallyLongPost) == strings.reallyLongPost}}
<strong>${translate("Warning: The following content is in English.")}</strong>
{{/if}}
 
{{html translate(strings.reallyLongPost)}}

I'm using jQuery Templates for Express here, but it should be easy to translate to whatever templating language you prefer.

Easy exporting of node-localize library to client without copying library into own source

Since node-localize can also run inside of the browser, and so can jQuery Templates, it can be quite useful to be able to export the library to the client. But rather than manually copying the library code into your website (and keeping track of updates/bugfixes manually), you can get the source code of node-localize directly from the library and add an Express route for it:

app.get('/js/localize.js', function(req, res) {
    res.send(Localize.source);
});

Where Localize is equivalent to require('localize'), not an instantiated localize object.

If you're using node-localize on the client in this fashion, it would be wise to add getTranslations and getDateFormats to the app.helpers object, so views can specify which translations and date formatting they need the client to have to function properly.

Planned Features

• Optional Country Code support (that falls back to baseline language translation if a specific country code is missing) for regional language differences
• Numeric localization (1,234,567.89 versus 1.234.567,89 versus 1 234 567,89 versus Japanese Numerals [no idea how to handle that one at the moment])
• Currency localization; not just representing $100.00 versus 100,00$, but perhaps hooking into currency conversion, as well.
• Pluralization; one area gettext still beats node-localize is the ability to pluralize words correctly when given the number to pluralize against.

License (MIT)

Copyright (C) 2011 by Agrosica, Inc, David Ellis, Felix Geisendörfer, Steven Levithan, Scott Trenda, Kris Kowal, Jerry Jalava, Clint Andrew Hall.

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.