Rails i18n
From the Trenches
Clemens Kofler

Hi, I’m Clemens!
(Clemens Kofler, clemensk)

Today, I’m going to talk about ...
• The latest developments in Ruby/Rails i18n
• Current problems (in Rails) and potential
future changes

i18n

http://guides.rails.info/i18n.html

i18n basics in 2 minutes

Do you like Gettext?
(of course it’s fake)

_
s_
p_
t
n_
ns_
np_

i18n news

Additions in i18n 0.2.0
• translation procs
• custom namespace separators
• Ruby 1.9-style string interpolation
• (symlinked translations)

+ a bunch of neat plugins
(list at the end)

Additions in i18n 0.2.0
• translation procs
• custom namespace separators
• Ruby 1.9-style string interpolation
• (symlinked translations)

bleeding edge

Current edge
• Base backend + module includes
• Pluralization module
• Cache module
• Locale fallbacks module from Globalize 2
• Chain backend from Globalize 2
• Gettext support (experimental)

Current edge
• Base backend + module includes
• Pluralization module
• Cache module
• Locale fallbacks module from Globalize 2
• Chain backend from Globalize 2
• Gettext support (experimental)

Current problems
• Tools
• Data input
• CLDR compliance
• Some unfinished integration (Date/Time#to_s, labels)
• Bad Rails implementations (AR Errors)
• (Clean) routing i18n nearly impossible
• (Gettext support / “enterprise-readiness”)

Tools

http://github.com/svenfuchs/i18n-tools

Parsing dates/times is
really hard
(you can try out my experimental delocalize plugin)

You can do something like this with
translate_routes but it’s basically a really
scary hack.

i18n vs. Gettext?

War? Not really.

We are not Gettext
(and we don’t want to be)
((ever))

Recommendations

The Setup
• i18n edge
• Translations from GitHub
• (Globalize 2 for model translations)
• (localized_dates for transparent date
handling)
• (delocalize for parsing localized input)
• (translate_routes for i18n routing)

Questions?

Some resources
• http://rails-i18n.org
• http://guides.rails.info/i18n.html
• http://github.com/svenfuchs/i18n
• http://github.com/svenfuchs/rails-i18n
• http://github.com/svenfuchs/i18n-tools
• http://groups.google.com/group/rails-i18n
• Pluralization rules: http://gist.github.com/106372

clemens@railway.at
http://www.railway.at
http://github.com/clemens

Image credits
• http://www.sxc.hu/photo/708615
• http://www.flickr.com/photos/ferneyes/469259974/
• http://aceitapretzel.files.wordpress.com/2008/09/dexter-ap.jpg
• http://www.flickr.com/photos/dunechaser/2936384313/
• http://www.festivalcervantino.gob.mx/Ficesmas/prensa/galerias/oct/12/
Hamletokok/images/061012_hamlet_20FGJ.jpg
• http://www.flickr.com/photos/srgblog/1408923862/
• http://www.flickr.com/photos/purrr/126597849/