Internationalization

• Language files
• Usage
• Language routing

The I18n class makes it easy to create a multilingual web application. You can add as many languages as you want.

The language packs are located in the app/resources/i18n directory and the files for each language are located in a subdirectory.

The name of a language pack should use the following convention: en_US (ISO 639-1 language code and ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 country code).

The default language of your application is defined in the app/config/application.php file.

Language files

Mako language files are just simple arrays:

<?php

// examples.php

return array
(
	'have_10_apples' => 'I have 10 apples',
	'have_n_apples'  => 'I have %d apples',
	'my_name_is'     => 'Hi! My name is %s',
);

Usage

Setting the language you want to use use is done by calling the language method. The method also returns the name of the current language.

I18n::language('no_NO'); // Setting the language to Norwegian

$language = I18n::language(); // The value of $language is now "no_NO"

Fetching a string is done with the get method. If no string is found then the key is returned. You can also use the __ convenience function.

// Will print "I have 10 apples"

echo I18n::get('examples.have_10_apples');

// Will print "I have 20 apples"

echo I18n::get('examples.have_n_apples', array(20));

// Will print "Hi! My name is Iroquois Pliskin"

echo __('examples.my_name_is', array('Iroquois Pliskin'));

You can check if a string exists using the has method.

$exists = I18n::has('my_key');

The pluralize method returns the plural form of the chosen noun. Unlike most other frameworks Mako will use language based inflection rules when pluralizing words.

The pluralize method will only work if the chosen language pack includes inflection rules.

echo I18n::pluralize('woman'); // Will print "women"

echo I18n::pluralize('woman', 1); // Will print "woman"

echo I18n::pluralize('woman', 2); // Will print "women"

You can also pluralize words in translated strings:

// In a language file caleld ui.php
 
return array
(
	'new_messages' => 'You have %1$u new <pluralize:%1$u>message</pluralize>.',
);
 
// In a view (using the template syntax)
 
{{__('ui.new_messages', array(1)}} // Will print "You have 1 new message."

{{__('ui.new_messages', array(10)}} // Will print "You have 10 new messages."

Language routing

Language route prefixes can be configured in the app/config/routes.php config file.

'languages' => array
(
	'no' => 'nb_NO',
),

Visiting http://example.org/no/foo/bar will load the norwegian language pack before executing the bar action of the foo controller.