Question

I’m localizing a WPF app using the LocBaml method. Everything works great for UI defined in .xaml files. However I have a few strings that are generated in codebehind that must also be localized. So I tried to take the approach recommended by Microsoft in this article. I have a xaml resource dictionary file as such:

<ResourceDictionary x:Uid="ResourceDictionary_1" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
 xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
 xmlns:system="clr-namespace:System;assembly=mscorlib">

     <!-- String resource that can be localized -->
     <system:String x:Uid="system:String_1" x:Key="localizedMessage">en-US Message</system:String>
</ResourceDictionary>

I then use a third-party tool to generate the localized resources.dll containing a spanish version of the resource dictionary.

However, when I call

string localizedMessage = (string)Application.Current.Resources["localizedMessage"];

localizedMessage always returns the value defined in the en-US version of the dll. I must be misunderstanding something. What do I have to do to get the localized version of the string returned?

Answer 1

After discussion with the OP, the problem is in setting the language too late (in App‘s OnStartup).

Indeed, the localized resource dictionaries are loaded once, using the current language of the thread. If the thread language changes too late, the resources are already loaded, and no reload is triggered.

A solution in this particular case would be to change the UI thread’s locale as early as possible — that is, in the App‘s constructor.