Internationalization

[brianmhunt]

KO needs some internationalization

Note:

• http://formatjs.io/
• http://i18next.com/
• http://stackoverflow.com/questions/11436685/
• http://stackoverflow.com/questions/16882171

[krnlde]

I worked with i18next and its adapters to angular a lot in the past. To me it feels really slick and natural. If you take knockout.punches into account you could solve it through piping as in angular:

<span>{{'general.greet' | translate::username}}</span>

Though the way the filter parameters are passed in ko.punches could be improved like so:

<span>{{'general.greet' | translate: {name: username} }}</span>

That way you would have named parameters and you wouldn't introduce a new syntax, instead you'd have an ordinary JavaScript object.

Number and Date formatting is not provided by i18next afaik. edit: apparently it does: http://i18next.com/translate/formatting/

[brianmhunt]

Given a binding translator (like i18next), there are three ways I think it could be employed:

1. A binding provider (i.e. tko.provider.i18n) - converts text nodes by running them through a binding-translator based on some criteria/regex/etc
2. an explicit i18n binding works like, or pairs with, the text binding
3. one or more i18n filters that pluralize/etc

A sane strategy for one or more of these probably requires delving into what others do.

[krnlde]

I wouldn't suggest using an explicit i18n-binding since it limits the possibilities to work with i18n. Think of attribute-values like placeholder or title. Think of combining multiple keys. The rest is totally cool :)

[miellaby]

To limit documentation effort, and despite API inconsistency, I'd suggest a provider of the exactly same syntax as https://github.com/i18next/jquery-i18next with the extra requiment that data-i18n-options might be subscribable and trigger a new translation when changing. Also this syntax is supported by https://github.com/i18next/i18next-parser

[brianmhunt]

@miellaby those are fantastic suggestions, thank you

[brianmhunt]

Noting: https://metacpan.org/pod/distribution/Locale-Maketext/lib/Locale/Maketext/TPJ13.pod?_ke=eyJrbF9lbWFpbCI6ICJicmlhbm1odW50QGdtYWlsLmNvbSIsICJrbF9jb21wYW55X2lkIjogImU3WUMzdSJ9#A_Localization_Horror_Story:_It_Could_Happen_To_You