[Gambas-user] Translating application

[Rob Kudla]

On Tue April 25 2006 11:28, Leonardo Miliani wrote:
> I would like to follow a more professional way, getting the
> user the ability to choose the interface language using the
> program menu (i.e., Tools/Language and then English/Italian)
> and having the interface language translated "on the run".
> How can I get this?

This is actually a less professional way (reminds me of video 
games and early Windows 3.x software, before setting the 
language in the operating system was common.)  

Nonetheless, the way to do what you want is the same way we did 
it back in the early 90's.... put placeholder text in all your 
controls (for example, the name of the control or a shortened 
version of the text to be displayed) and loop through them 
replacing the placeholder with the language-appropriate string 
when you display each form or change the setting.  You can store 
the strings in an ini file or database or whatever you like. 

You'll probably want to mark the project as "not translatable" to 
avoid any fights between your app and Gambas' own translation 
support.... and since, after all, it won't be translatable in 
any standard way.

Rob