Localization with ASP.NET MVC using Routing

Question

I'm going to implement an ASP.NET MVC3 powered site which will be multilingual with distinct Urls for different languages (ie. http://acme.com/en/faq, http://acme.com/de/faq etc).

Is the way outlined in this article still the way to go with ASP.Net MVC3?

Hector Correa · Accepted Answer · 2011-10-19 20:54:57Z

3

I haven't use a route handler like the author of the blog suggest but it seems like a good idea.

I typically just add the language as a parameter to the route, though.

routes.MapRoute("someroute", "{language}/some/path/{p1}/{p2}",
    new { controller = "SomeController", action = "SomeAction"});

You can default the language parameter right there on the route definition but I usually do it on the base controller since I try to default to the language that the user has defined on their browser preferences (it comes in the HTTP request.)

One caveat of the approach described in the blog post is that is changes the main "CurrentCulture". You don't want to change the main "CurrentCulture" on every request, you only need to change the "CurrentUICulture". Changing the main "CurrentCulture" would affect the way your server behaves. For example, when talking to the database it will be using the user's culture and that's probably not what you want.

People tend to change the main CurrentCulture to gain formatting on dates and numbers (which is nice) but don't realize there are some side effects to doing that. Instead of changing the main CultureThread you'll need to pass the users' culture to your number and formatting functions (e.g. someDate.ToString(format, culture)

answered Oct 19, 2011 at 20:54

Hector Correa

26.7k8 gold badges61 silver badges76 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

2 Comments

Serge Wautier Over a year ago

I don't quite agree with your argument in favor of unchanged CurrentCulture: If you have some processing that depend on a culture that isn't visitor's culture, which culture do you use then?

Hector Correa Over a year ago

@Serge-appTranlator: If you do have a need to change the culture in the server by all means do it, just be aware that there are implications. Most people just change it because of the convenience of number and date formatting without realizing that there are other implications to be aware of.

Eduardo Molteni · Accepted Answer · 2011-10-19 21:07:01Z

1

Yes, nothing have changed from the routing perspective.

answered Oct 19, 2011 at 21:07

Eduardo Molteni

39.5k25 gold badges145 silver badges212 bronze badges

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

Localization with ASP.NET MVC using Routing

2 Answers 2

2 Comments

Comments

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

2 Answers 2

2 Comments

Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related