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InternationalizationComparison (Version #126)

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Options available February 2008

• Globalize
• Ruby-GetText-Package
• Localize (has not been updated since Oct. 2005 (as of Jan. 2008))
• GLoc (has not been updated since Feb. 2007 (as of Jan. 2008))
• Localization Simplified (project page)
• Ri18n
• Simple Localization
• Gibberish
• ActiveCulture
• GlobaLite localization made simple and lite. Read more
• With JRuby, the full I18n functionality of Java is available for Rails applications (not covered in this comparison)
• mod-i18n

Most probably dead

• Multilingual

Multilingual is a project by Per Wigren that does not seem to have been in active development for some time. Globalize took many ideas from Multilingual and was at one early stage called “Multilingual”, but the two projects have little in common now." ("Josh Harvey)

Feature Comparison

feature	Globalize	Ruby-GetText-Package	Localize	GLoc	Localization Simplified	Ri18n	Simple Localization	ActiveCulture
type	plugin	gem library	plugin	plugin	plugin	gem/plugin	plugin	plugin
version	edge	1.92.0	?	1.1	0.9	?	2.3.3	0.1
Last Updated	Dec. 2007	May. 2008	Oct. 2005	Feb. 2007	Jan. 2008	May. 2005	Jan 2008	Feb 2008
Rails 1.1 ready	yes	yes	yes	yes	yes	?	yes	no
Rails 1.2 ready	yes	yes	?	yes	yes	?	yes	no more
Rails 2.x ready	2.0.1	2.1.0	yes	?	?	?	yes	yes
JRuby 1.1 ready	?	yes	?	?	?	?	?	?
Currently supported locales4	7599 languages and 239 countries	bs, ca, cs, de, el, en, eo, es, et, fr, hr, it, ja, ko, nb, nl, pt_BR, ru, sr, sv, vi, zh(zh_CN), zh_TW	?	?	da, de, en, se, fr, ca_fr, cf, fi, it, ko, lv, nl, no, pt, ru, se, sr (+ swedish chef and pirate talk)	?	de, en, nl, fr	en, ru, uk
L10n of rails views	yes	yes	?	yes	no (not needed)	?	yes	yes
L10n of rails error messages	most	yes	no	most	yes	?	yes	yes
L10n of rails models and attributes	?	yes	?	no, maybe soon	partly7	?	yes	yes
L10n of date formats	yes	yes13	yes	yes	yes	?	yes	yes
L10n of numbers	yes	yes13	yes	no	yes	?	yes	yes
L10n of rails helpers2	yes (except for to_sentence, Time#to_formatted_s, Date#to_formatted_s, date_select)	yes3	no	yes (except for countries, time-zones, to_sentence )	yes	?	yes	yes
Translatable model data	yes	yes9	?	no	no	?	no	no
Support for multi-lingual content in same view	yes	yes	?	yes	no	?	yes	yes
Extract strings automaticaly	no1	yes	yes	no	no (not needed)	?	no	no
Stored messages in	DB	file (.po)	file(.rb)	file(.yml)	file(.rb)	?	file(.yml)	files(.yml)
Support tools to maintain	rake for db setup/cleanup	yes(as rake task, and others) 14	?	yes	no	?	no	none
Multi textdomain	yes	yes	?	yes	no	?	?	yes
Plural/Singular messages	yes	yes5	yes	yes5	yes	?	yes	yes5
Auto finding the client locale	?	yes	?	yes	no	?	no	no
Caching in memory	yes	yes	?	yes	yes	?	yes	yes
Page Caching	?	no	?	?	?	?	?	no
Action Caching	?	yes	?	?	?	?	?	no
Fragment Caching	?	yes	?	?	?	?	?	no
Work without DB	no	yes	?	yes	yes	?	yes	yes
Work without Rails	no	yes	?	yes	no	yes	no	yes
App still works without plugin/gem	no	yes6	no	no	yes	yes	yes10	no
Localized values can be other formats such as Procs	?	no	?	yes (1.2 onwards)	no	?	no	yes
Scaffolding	?	yes8	?	?	?	?	no	no
GetText based	no	yes	no	no	no	yes	no	no
DB dependency	PostgreSQL, MySQL, Sqlite3 and Oracle	no	no	no	no	?	no	no
Haml l10n	?	yes11	?	?	?	?	no	?
ActiveScaffold l10n	?	yes12	?	?	?	?	?	?
Documentation	good	excellent! (Tutorials, complete Rdocs)	scarce	good (complete Rdocs)	good	good (complete Rdocs)	good (detailed documentation, complete RDocs)	evolving (wiki)
License	MIT	Ruby’s	?	MIT	MIT	GPL	MIT	MIT

¹ Stores untranslated text to database dynamically.

² select_date(), distance_of_time_in_words(), Date.to_formatted_s, Time.to_formatted_s, Number.to_currency , etc.

³ distance_of_time_in_words() only

⁴ Have the locale data in the package(plugin/library).

⁵ Pluralization rules definable by translator so langs with complicated pluralization rules like Russian work too

⁶ To make your app work without Ruby-GetText-Package:
See: http://www.yotabanana.com/hiki/ruby-gettext-howto-rails.html#MakeRuby-GetTextas+an+option+of+your+app

⁷ Localization/translation of models provided via Rails’ standard Inflector mechanism

⁸ With GettextScaffold plugin
http://rubyforge.org/projects/gettextscaffold

$ ruby script/plugin install svn://rubyforge.org/var/svn/gettextscaffold/gettext_scaffold

$ rake script/generate gettext_scaffold foo

⁹ With “Act as Translatable plugin”
http://blog.wireless.org.ua/articles/2006/10/30/acts-as-translatable-ruby-on-rails-plugin

¹⁰ Some extended features can not be used to not break the application without the plugin.

¹¹ Haml Parsing for Ruby-GetText
http://blog.teamschnitzel.com/2007/05/14/haml-parsing-for-ruby-gettext/

¹² ActiveScaffold Localization
http://wiki.activescaffold.com/wiki/published/Integrating+Ruby-GetText

¹³ Gettext Localize Plugin
http://gettextlocalize.rubyforge.org/

¹⁴ Utitlities for GetText families to maintain translation files.
* GNU Gettext package
msginit, msgmerge, and other utilitiess. Excelent tutorials.

http://www.gnu.org/software/gettext/manual/gettext.html

• Translate Toolkit & Pootle
  http://translate.sourceforge.net/
• poEdit
  http://www.poedit.net/
• KBabel
  http://kbabel.kde.org/

References

• Rails I18N at rubyforge
• Forum (railsi18n-discussion@rubyforge.org)
• Locale definitions and formats list
• Rails Wiki: RailsLocalization, Internationalization, HowToUseUnicodeStrings, i18n, Localization?, MultiLingualRails, LocalizingDates, OverridingRailsMessagesInAnotherLanguage, HowToLocalizeActiveRecordErrors
• Agile Web Development plugin list
• no one cares about i18n
• Rails core going multiligual…ever?
• Suggested code for auto finding the client locale

Blogs

• Robby Russel aka. Robby On Rails
• Jesper Rønn-Jensen: Ruby on Rails plugin: Localize your Rails app
• Internationalization with JRuby

Options available February 2008

• Globalize
• Ruby-GetText-Package
• Localize (has not been updated since Oct. 2005 (as of Jan. 2008))
• GLoc (has not been updated since Feb. 2007 (as of Jan. 2008))
• Localization Simplified (project page)
• Ri18n
• Simple Localization
• Gibberish
• ActiveCulture
• GlobaLite localization made simple and lite. Read more
• With JRuby, the full I18n functionality of Java is available for Rails applications (not covered in this comparison)
• mod-i18n

Most probably dead

• Multilingual

Multilingual is a project by Per Wigren that does not seem to have been in active development for some time. Globalize took many ideas from Multilingual and was at one early stage called “Multilingual”, but the two projects have little in common now." ("Josh Harvey)

Feature Comparison

feature	Globalize	Ruby-GetText-Package	Localize	GLoc	Localization Simplified	Ri18n	Simple Localization	ActiveCulture
type	plugin	gem library	plugin	plugin	plugin	gem/plugin	plugin	plugin
version	edge	1.92.0	?	1.1	0.9	?	2.3.3	0.1
Last Updated	Dec. 2007	May. 2008	Oct. 2005	Feb. 2007	Jan. 2008	May. 2005	Jan 2008	Feb 2008
Rails 1.1 ready	yes	yes	yes	yes	yes	?	yes	no
Rails 1.2 ready	yes	yes	?	yes	yes	?	yes	no more
Rails 2.x ready	2.0.1	2.1.0	yes	?	?	?	yes	yes
JRuby 1.1 ready	?	yes	?	?	?	?	?	?
Currently supported locales4	7599 languages and 239 countries	bs, ca, cs, de, el, en, eo, es, et, fr, hr, it, ja, ko, nb, nl, pt_BR, ru, sr, sv, vi, zh(zh_CN), zh_TW	?	?	da, de, en, se, fr, ca_fr, cf, fi, it, ko, lv, nl, no, pt, ru, se, sr (+ swedish chef and pirate talk)	?	de, en, nl, fr	en, ru, uk
L10n of rails views	yes	yes	?	yes	no (not needed)	?	yes	yes
L10n of rails error messages	most	yes	no	most	yes	?	yes	yes
L10n of rails models and attributes	?	yes	?	no, maybe soon	partly7	?	yes	yes
L10n of date formats	yes	yes13	yes	yes	yes	?	yes	yes
L10n of numbers	yes	yes13	yes	no	yes	?	yes	yes
L10n of rails helpers2	yes (except for to_sentence, Time#to_formatted_s, Date#to_formatted_s, date_select)	yes3	no	yes (except for countries, time-zones, to_sentence )	yes	?	yes	yes
Translatable model data	yes	yes9	?	no	no	?	no	no
Support for multi-lingual content in same view	yes	yes	?	yes	no	?	yes	yes
Extract strings automaticaly	no1	yes	yes	no	no (not needed)	?	no	no
Stored messages in	DB	file (.po)	file(.rb)	file(.yml)	file(.rb)	?	file(.yml)	files(.yml)
Support tools to maintain	rake for db setup/cleanup	yes(as rake task, and others) 14	?	yes	no	?	no	none
Multi textdomain	yes	yes	?	yes	no	?	?	yes
Plural/Singular messages	yes	yes5	yes	yes5	yes	?	yes	yes5
Auto finding the client locale	?	yes	?	yes	no	?	no	no
Caching in memory	yes	yes	?	yes	yes	?	yes	yes
Page Caching	?	no	?	?	?	?	?	no
Action Caching	?	yes	?	?	?	?	?	no
Fragment Caching	?	yes	?	?	?	?	?	no
Work without DB	no	yes	?	yes	yes	?	yes	yes
Work without Rails	no	yes	?	yes	no	yes	no	yes
App still works without plugin/gem	no	yes6	no	no	yes	yes	yes10	no
Localized values can be other formats such as Procs	?	no	?	yes (1.2 onwards)	no	?	no	yes
Scaffolding	?	yes8	?	?	?	?	no	no
GetText based	no	yes	no	no	no	yes	no	no
DB dependency	PostgreSQL, MySQL, Sqlite3 and Oracle	no	no	no	no	?	no	no
Haml l10n	?	yes11	?	?	?	?	no	?
ActiveScaffold l10n	?	yes12	?	?	?	?	?	?
Documentation	good	excellent! (Tutorials, complete Rdocs)	scarce	good (complete Rdocs)	good	good (complete Rdocs)	good (detailed documentation, complete RDocs)	evolving (wiki)
License	MIT	Ruby’s	?	MIT	MIT	GPL	MIT	MIT

¹ Stores untranslated text to database dynamically.

² select_date(), distance_of_time_in_words(), Date.to_formatted_s, Time.to_formatted_s, Number.to_currency , etc.

³ distance_of_time_in_words() only

⁴ Have the locale data in the package(plugin/library).

⁵ Pluralization rules definable by translator so langs with complicated pluralization rules like Russian work too

⁶ To make your app work without Ruby-GetText-Package:
See: http://www.yotabanana.com/hiki/ruby-gettext-howto-rails.html#MakeRuby-GetTextas+an+option+of+your+app

⁷ Localization/translation of models provided via Rails’ standard Inflector mechanism

⁸ With GettextScaffold plugin
http://rubyforge.org/projects/gettextscaffold

$ ruby script/plugin install svn://rubyforge.org/var/svn/gettextscaffold/gettext_scaffold

$ rake script/generate gettext_scaffold foo

⁹ With “Act as Translatable plugin”
http://blog.wireless.org.ua/articles/2006/10/30/acts-as-translatable-ruby-on-rails-plugin

¹⁰ Some extended features can not be used to not break the application without the plugin.

¹¹ Haml Parsing for Ruby-GetText
http://blog.teamschnitzel.com/2007/05/14/haml-parsing-for-ruby-gettext/

¹² ActiveScaffold Localization
http://wiki.activescaffold.com/wiki/published/Integrating+Ruby-GetText

¹³ Gettext Localize Plugin
http://gettextlocalize.rubyforge.org/

¹⁴ Utitlities for GetText families to maintain translation files.
* GNU Gettext package
msginit, msgmerge, and other utilitiess. Excelent tutorials.

http://www.gnu.org/software/gettext/manual/gettext.html

• Translate Toolkit & Pootle
  http://translate.sourceforge.net/
• poEdit
  http://www.poedit.net/
• KBabel
  http://kbabel.kde.org/

References

• Rails I18N at rubyforge
• Forum (railsi18n-discussion@rubyforge.org)
• Locale definitions and formats list
• Rails Wiki: RailsLocalization, Internationalization, HowToUseUnicodeStrings, i18n, Localization?, MultiLingualRails, LocalizingDates, OverridingRailsMessagesInAnotherLanguage, HowToLocalizeActiveRecordErrors
• Agile Web Development plugin list
• no one cares about i18n
• Rails core going multiligual…ever?
• Suggested code for auto finding the client locale

Blogs

• Robby Russel aka. Robby On Rails
• Jesper Rønn-Jensen: Ruby on Rails plugin: Localize your Rails app
• Internationalization with JRuby

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