Languages and String Resources

Table of Contents

• About
• Resources
• Language
• Further Reading

About

Data Descriptions store descriptions of attributes. This includes the translated names of these attributes in various languages. Using maxon::Resource and maxon::LanguageInterface it is easily possible to access such translated strings.

Note

maxon::Resource::LoadResourceString() and maxon::LanguageInterface::LoadResourceString() access the same data as maxon::DataDescriptionDatabaseInterface::LoadDescription().

Resources

The maxon::Resource class gives access to the supported languages:

• maxon::Resource::GetDefaultLanguage(): Returns the default language.
• maxon::Resource::GetCurrentLanguage(): Returns the current language.
• maxon::Resource::SetCurrentLanguage(): Sets the current language.
• maxon::Resource::FindLanguage(): Returns the language for the given ID.
• maxon::Resource::GetAllLanguages(): Returns all languages.

  // This example loops through all known languages and prints their names.
 
  // get current language for later comparison
  const maxon::LanguageRef currentLanguage = maxon::Resource::GetCurrentLanguage();
 
  // get all languages
  const auto languages = maxon::Resource::GetAllLanguages() iferr_return;
 
  // loop through all languages
  for (const maxon::LanguageRef& language : languages)
  {
    // print language name
    DiagnosticOutput("Language: @", language.GetName());
 
    // check if language is the current language
    if (currentLanguage == language)
      DiagnosticOutput("--> Current Language");
  }

A localized string of the current language can be obtained with:

• maxon::Resource::LoadResourceString(): Returns the string for the given attribute.

  // This example loads the string for the given attribute in the current language.
 
  // prepare database and attribute IDs
  const maxon::Id   databaseID { "net.maxonexample.description" };
  maxon::InternedId attributeID;
  attributeID.Init("net.maxonexample.description.option") iferr_return;
 
  // get string
  const maxon::String localizedString = maxon::Resource::LoadResourceString(databaseID, attributeID);
  DiagnosticOutput("Localized String: \"@\"", localizedString);

Language

The properties of a language object are accessed with:

• maxon::LanguageInterface::GetName(): Returns the name of the language.
• maxon::LanguageInterface::GetIdentifier(): Returns the ID of the language.
• maxon::LanguageInterface::GetFallbackLanguage(): Returns the fallback language.

  // This example gets the current language and prints its settings to the console.
 
  // get current language
  const maxon::LanguageRef language = maxon::Resource::GetCurrentLanguage();
 
  // get language settings
  const maxon::String languageName = language.GetName();
  const maxon::Id     languageId = language.GetIdentifier();
 
  DiagnosticOutput("Language: \"@\" (@)", languageName, languageId);

A localized string of a given language can be obtained with:

• maxon::LanguageInterface::LoadResourceString(): Returns the string for the given attribute.

  // This example loads the string for the given attribute in the current language.
 
  // prepare database and attribute IDs
  const maxon::Id   database("net.maxonexample.description");
  maxon::InternedId attribute;
  attribute.Init("net.maxonexample.description.option") iferr_return;
 
  // get string
  const maxon::LanguageRef language = maxon::Resource::GetCurrentLanguage();
  const maxon::String      localizedString = language.LoadResourceString(database, attribute);
  DiagnosticOutput("Localized String: \"@\"", localizedString);

Further Reading

• Data Descriptions
• String Manual