Globalization

1
Ottawa .Net CommunityMCTS 70-526 Study Group

• Chapter 11
• Lesson 2
• Globalization Localization

2
Overview

• Why do it?
• To present your App with appropriate formatting,
  in the language, or Culture, appropriate for
  your intended audience.
• Especially in Ottawa, all our apps should be
  bi-lingual!

3
What is a Culture?

• A Culture refers to cultural information
  pertaining to a particular country or region,
  such as
• Language (French, English)
• LeftToRight vs. RightToLeft Alphabet, Arabic
• Currency Formatting , , , (Japanese are always
  interesting because they never display decimal
  places)
• Date Formats
• Colour (in some cultures, RED may be an
  undesirable colour)

4
Culture Codes

• Culture Codes define what culture your app will
  used as defined in the CultureInfo Class.
• The CultureInfo class contains built-in
  information about cultures based on the set
  CultureCode.
• Codes format
• ltLanguagegt and/or ltRegiongt and/or ltAlphabetgt
• Ie. en English
• fr-CA French Canada
• uz-UZ-Latn Uzbek, Uzbekistan, Latin alphabet

5
How to set Culture?

• Set the Culture of an application by setting
  the current thread to a new instance of the
  CultureInfo class
• Sytem.Threading.Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentUIC
  ulture new System.Globalization.CultureInfo(
  fr-CA)
• Set Culture before the form has been created,
  either
• in the forms constructor
• or in the Apps main method

6
Culture vs. UICulture

• The Culture value determines the results of
  culture-dependent functions, such as the date,
  number, and currency formatting, and so on.
• The UICulture value determines which resources
  are loaded for the page.
• Samples
• System.Threading.Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentCultu
  re New System.Globalization.CultureInfo("fr-FR")
  
• System.Threading.Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentUICul
  ture New System.Globalization.CultureInfo("fr-FR
  ")

7
How to Culturize your App?

• Easily done with
• Globalization (Data formatting)
• Localization (Language used in text)
• Mirroring Forms (built-in function)
• Setting properties programmatically (like colours)

8
Globalization

• The process of formatting application data in
  formats appropriate for the locale
• Also referred to as internationalization (i18n)
• Applies to data
• Correct Text Format(500,currency)
• Wrong Text 500.00

9
Localization

• The process of loading displaying localized
  strings, defined in resource files, in the User
  Interface
• Ie. All text in the form is displayed in the
  language desired by your audience.
• Also called (L10n)
• Applies to static text on a form
• Visual Studio automatically creates resource
  files for you

10
How to Localize a Form?

• Only available at design time
• Set Form.Localizable True
• Set Form.Language ltselect a language from the
  listgt
• This puts you in Localize mode (can not add any
  other controls while in this mode)
• Set language to default to go back into Design
  mode
• Type in your new text in the selected language,
  then, when you save the form, Visual Studio
  automatically creates a Resource file for you
  (ie. Form.en-CA.resx)

11
Reference Culture Code

• Refer to the current Culture Code by
• Globalization.CultureInfo.CurrentCulture.ToString
  

12
Default Language
13
Set default language in the Control Panel
14
App.Config

• You can set the default Culture used by the App
  in the App.Config file
• ltglobalization uiculture"en" culture"en-CA" /gt

15
Right to Left

• Why? Depending on language, text may be read
  RightToLeft
• How? Set Control.LeftToRight Property
• text alignment reversed
• form captions on right
• vertical scroll bars on left
• inherits Parent setting
• Actual data content is unchanged

16
Mirroring

• Simply displays the form in its mirrored layout
  (all controls flipped vertically to other side of
  the form).
• 1. Set Form.RightToLeftlayout TRUE
• 2. Set Form.LeftToRight TRUE
• The form will appear mirrored.
• NOTE Must set both properties.
• Setting 1. on its own does nothing.
• Setting 2. on its own changes the orientation
• of each control individually.

17
Demo

• Create a multi-lingual app using Globalization
  Localization
• Use Mirroring
• Set properties based on CultureCode
• Creating Resource Files
• Set default Culture in Control Panel vs.
  App.Config