Question

I search around the web, but I can’t find the answer, maybe this question is too simple.

In the app I developed, how to display those default items, such as back BarButtonItem, ImagePicker buttons, or in the UITextView, the pop-up menu with copy, paste, cut, replace and select all, I can’t figure out how to display these items in other language, for example, Chinese, Japanese etc.

Thanks.

Answer 1

I wrote a tutorial on this where I stepped through how to do this (based on an application I localized in six languages):

Developing localized iPhone applications

http://www.pushplay.net/2009/08/developing-localized-iphone-applications/

I also described some of the language/idiom issues I was dealing with, which might be useful to keep in mind. There is the technical problem of how to implement multiple languages, but there is also the communication problem of having things be nonsensical when directly translated out of context…

EDIT: to respond to your comment, I’d still do it the same way (localizing everything). If not, set it up to localize anyway, but only translate the specific strings you want (and leave the rest as English).

If you really want to do everything yourself, you can do this:

NSUserDefaults *defaults = [NSUserDefaults standardUserDefaults];
NSArray *languages = [defaults objectForKey:@"AppleLanguages"];
NSString *currentLanguage = [languages objectAtIndex:0];

Then you can compare the currentLanguage variable and display the proper text in an if/then/else if/etc code block. I’d probably recommend having an “else display in english” at the end of the code block, just in case the language returned is different from what you were expecting.

EDIT: I just re-read what you were asking, and realized you meant localizing system functions. That’s not something you can control — when a user goes into their Settings and changes their language, all of those system interfaces (like “Cut/Copy/Paste”) will automatically be localized. As long as they set their proper language in their Settings, that should work automatically.