1 page.title=Supporting Different Languages 2 parent.title=Supporting Different Devices 3 page.tags=strings,localizing,localization,resources,formats,l10n 4 helpoutsWidget=true 5 6 trainingnavtop=true 7 8 @jd:body 9 10 11 <div id="tb-wrapper"> 12 <div id="tb"> 13 <h2>This class teaches you to</h2> 14 <ol> 15 <li><a href="#CreateDirs">Create Locale Directories and String Files</a></li> 16 <li><a href="#UseString">Use the String Resources</a></li> 17 </ol> 18 <h2>You should also read</h2> 19 <ul> 20 <li><a href="{@docRoot}distribute/tools/localization-checklist.html">Localization Checklist</a></li> 21 <li><a href="{@docRoot}guide/topics/resources/localization.html">Localization with Resources</a></li> 22 </ul> 23 </div> 24 </div> 25 26 <p>Its always a good practice to extract UI strings from your app code and keep them 27 in an external file. Android makes this easy with a resources directory in each Android 28 project.</p> 29 30 <p>If you created your project using the Android SDK 31 Tools (read <a href="{@docRoot}training/basics/firstapp/creating-project.html">Creating an 32 Android Project</a>), the tools create a <code>res/</code> directory in the top level of 33 the project. Within this <code>res/</code> directory are subdirectories for various resource 34 types. There are also a few default files such as <code>res/values/strings.xml</code>, which holds 35 your string values.</p> 36 37 38 <h2 id="CreateDirs">Create Locale Directories and String Files</h2> 39 40 <p>To add support for more languages, create additional <code>values</code> directories inside 41 <code>res/</code> that include a hyphen and the ISO language code at the end of the 42 directory name. For example, <code>values-es/</code> is the directory containing simple 43 resourcess for the Locales with the language code "es". Android loads the appropriate resources 44 according to the locale settings of the device at run time. For more information, see 45 <a href="{@docRoot}guide/topics/resources/providing-resources.html#AlternativeResources">Providing Alternative Resources</a>.</p> 46 47 <p>Once youve decided on the languages you will support, create the resource subdirectories and 48 string resource files. For example:</p> 49 50 <pre class="classic no-pretty-print"> 51 MyProject/ 52 res/ 53 values/ 54 strings.xml 55 values-es/ 56 strings.xml 57 values-fr/ 58 strings.xml 59 </pre> 60 61 <p>Add the string values for each locale into the appropriate file.</p> 62 63 <p>At runtime, the Android system uses the appropriate set of string resources based on the 64 locale currently set for the user's device.</p> 65 66 <p>For example, the following are some different string resource files for different languages.</p> 67 68 69 <p>English (default locale), <code>/values/strings.xml</code>:</p> 70 71 <pre> 72 <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> 73 <resources> 74 <string name="title">My Application</string> 75 <string name="hello_world">Hello World!</string> 76 </resources> 77 </pre> 78 79 80 <p>Spanish, <code>/values-es/strings.xml</code>:</p> 81 82 <pre> 83 <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> 84 <resources> 85 <string name="title">Mi Aplicacin</string> 86 <string name="hello_world">Hola Mundo!</string> 87 </resources> 88 </pre> 89 90 91 <p>French, <code>/values-fr/strings.xml</code>:</p> 92 93 <pre> 94 <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> 95 <resources> 96 <string name="title">Mon Application</string> 97 <string name="hello_world">Bonjour le monde !</string> 98 </resources> 99 </pre> 100 101 <p class="note"><strong>Note:</strong> You can use the locale qualifier (or any 102 configuration qualifer) on any resource type, such as if you want to provide 103 localized versions of your bitmap drawable. For more information, see <a 104 href="{@docRoot}guide/topics/resources/localization.html">Localization</a>. 105 106 <h2 id="UseString">Use the String Resources</h2> 107 108 <p>You can reference your string resources in your source code and other XML files using the 109 resource name defined by the {@code <string>} element's {@code name} attribute.</p> 110 111 <p>In your source code, you can refer to a string resource with the syntax {@code 112 R.string.<string_name>}. There are a variety of methods that accept a string resource this 113 way.</p> 114 115 <p>For example:</p> 116 117 <pre> 118 // Get a string resource from your app's {@link android.content.res.Resources} 119 String hello = {@link android.content.Context#getResources()}.getString(R.string.hello_world); 120 121 // Or supply a string resource to a method that requires a string 122 TextView textView = new TextView(this); 123 textView.setText(R.string.hello_world); 124 </pre> 125 126 <p>In other XML files, you can refer to a string resource with the syntax {@code 127 @string/<string_name>} whenever the XML attribute accepts a string value.</p> 128 129 <p>For example:</p> 130 131 <pre> 132 <TextView 133 android:layout_width="wrap_content" 134 android:layout_height="wrap_content" 135 android:text="@string/hello_world" /> 136 </pre> 137 138 139 140
