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Introduction

While seeking on the internet for a solution to implement localization within an ASP.NET application using a MasterPage, I realized that a lot of people have got the same problem to solve. Unfortunately, I could not find a suitable solution thus, I intended to do my own implementation.

Background

The solution presented within this article uses the standard localization mechanism of the .NET framework.

Using the code

The published solution uses the Session object as storage for the currently selected culture. This will be initialized during the Session_Start method that is part of the global.asax file.

If a culture change is requested by the user, the MasterPage changes the stored culture in the Session object.

In a BasePage that inherits from Page, the method InitializeCulture is overridden and sets the appropriate culture information stored in the Session object to the current thread. Therefore, every Web Form needs to derive from this BasePage.

Let's start with the Global.asax file:

void Session_Start(object sender, EventArgs e) 
{
    //set english as default startup language
    Session["MyCulture"] = "en-GB";
}

Alternatively, the culture can be defined in the Web.config file with the key <globalization culture="en-GB" /> and then be processed and stored in the Session object from the Session_Start method.

The next step is the master page:

<%@ Master Language="C#" AutoEventWireup="true" 
           CodeFile="MasterPage.master.cs" Inherits="MasterPage" %>
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" 
         "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">

<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" >
<head runat="server">
    <title>[Smart-Soft - Masterpage with Localization Support]</title>
</head>

<body>
    <form id="theForm" runat="server">
    <div>
        <asp:contentplaceholder id="ContentPlaceHolder" runat="server">
        </asp:contentplaceholder>
    </div>
    <div style="margin-top:20px;">
        <asp:LinkButton ID="btnSetGerman" runat="server" Text="Deutsch" 
           CommandArgument="de-CH" OnClick="RequestLanguageChange_Click">
        </asp:LinkButton>  
        <asp:LinkButton ID="btnSetEnglish" runat="server" Text="English" 
           CommandArgument="en-GB" OnClick="RequestLanguageChange_Click">
        </asp:LinkButton>
    </div>
    </form>
</body>
</html>

The buttons to change the culture can be either placed in the MasterPage directly, or in any embedded UserControl. In order to determine the requested language, the CommandArgument attribute of the LinkButton is used.

..And the code-behind of the master page:

public partial class MasterPage : System.Web.UI.MasterPage
{
    protected void Page_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
    {
    }

    protected void RequestLanguageChange_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
    {
        LinkButton senderLink = sender as LinkButton;

        //store requested language as new culture in the session
        Session["MyCulture"] = senderLink.CommandArgument;

        //reload last requested page with new culture
        Server.Transfer(Request.Path);
    }
}

The requested language, passed within the CommandArgument, is processed and stored in the Session object. Afterwards, the initially requested page will be reloaded on the server side.

Last but not least, the BasePage:

/// <summary>
/// Custom base page used for all web forms.
/// </summary>
public class BasePage : Page
{
    private const string m_DefaultCulture = "en-GB";
    
    protected override void InitializeCulture()
    {
        //retrieve culture information from session
        string culture = Convert.ToString(Session["MyCulture"]);

        //check whether a culture is stored in the session
        if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(culture)) Culture = culture;
        else Culture = m_DefaultCulture;

        //set culture to current thread
        Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentCulture = CultureInfo.CreateSpecificCulture(culture);
        Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentUICulture = new CultureInfo(culture);

        //call base class
        base.InitializeCulture();
    }
}

As mentioned above, the InitializeCulture method is overridden, and gets the stored culture from the Session object and assigns it to the currently running thread.

Remark: In this article, only the culture was mentioned. Of course, there is also the UI culture. But it is not of any further interest in this article since the handling is absolutely identical. For more information, please see the MSDN pages. :)

For a running example, download the Zip file above.

History

11 May 2007 - First version released.

License

This article, along with any associated source code and files, is licensed under The Code Project Open License (CPOL)

About the Author

Michael Ulmann

MCAD, MCPD Web Developer
Visit my Space: http://ukmichael.spaces.live.com
Company information: www.smart-soft.ch

Occupation:	Software Developer
Company:	Smart-Soft
Location:	Australia

Other popular Localisation articles:

Introduction to Software Translation for MFC
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Multiple language support for MFC applications with extension DLL
This document discusses: how to build a resource only language DLL, how to detect OS language setting, how to load language DLL from extension DLL, and an MFC application.
Multilingual support for applications
An easy solution to add multilingual support to your application in 10 minutes.
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A ready-to-use class to load resource DLLs and create a Languages menu.
Windows SetThreadLocale and CRT setlocale
Keeps CRT locale status in synch with Windows thread locale.

Article Top

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Msgs 1 to 15 of 15 (Total in Forum: 15) (Refresh)

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Subject

Author

Date

Really helpful but...

famous

1:49 29 May '08

Excellent article but in that way we have to place the

InitializeCulture()

override function in every aspx page. I found the following code in asp.net forums where instead of placing the localization change in every page we just place it in

Application_PreRequestHandlerExecute

of global.asax and everything goes fine:

if (Context.Session != null && Context.Session["MyCulture"] != null)
        {
            String selectedLanguage = Context.Session["MyCulture"].ToString().ToLower();
            String currentLanguage = CultureInfo.CurrentUICulture.TwoLetterISOLanguageName.ToLower();
            if (!currentLanguage.Equals(selectedLanguage))
            {
                Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentUICulture = new CultureInfo(selectedLanguage);
            }
        }

In my case where changing the language from a master page imagebutton it works perfectly.
I just post it in case anyone finds that helpful.

In conclusion your article was really helpful.
Thanks.

Stelios

Excellent Article

M_Menon

2:17 21 May '08

I was trying to overload the InitializeCulture() inside my Control form and i was getting an error. Well you found the solution.. INHERITANCE...base class and all OOPS concepts. Excellent Article. Keep up good work. Hope to see more articles from you. Cheers Menon
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Initializing the language automatically

Guillaume Hanique

0:24 8 May '08

Hi, great article on how to change languages on a site! It could also be initialized by looking at Request.UserLanguages(0), which is the language the user set in his/her browser. So mine could be set to German, while someone else's might be set to English. That way the site will display in the user's primary language.
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Hot

paulklee

18:11 5 May '08

Thanks a lot for sharing that!
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Perfect example for localization

fristi

5:13 24 Mar '08

thnx Bart
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Great, Nice One!

theRexMundi

3:21 12 Mar '08

Really helpful and easy to use solutions. Many Thanks
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Multiple MasterPage or no MasterPage use the global.asax

Jcmorin

4:48 24 Jan '08

If you have multiple MasterPage and you don't want the duplicate the code, or if you do not use masterpage at all, you set the thread culture in the global.asax
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Excellent

merlin981

5:00 9 Nov '07

Nice, easy to implement solution. Well done! 5 from me ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Rhabot - World of Warcraft Bot Long URL's get neat with NeatURL.net ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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good solution for multilanguage website

havan_nd

18:57 7 Nov '07

Thanks for your article. havan
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Question about Code (possible bug)

Urs Enzler

3:04 14 Sep '07

You use the following code in the InitializeCulture method:


//retrieve culture information from session
string culture = Convert.ToString(Session["MyCulture"]);

//check whether a culture is stored in the session
if (culture.Length > 0) Culture = culture;

//set culture to current thread
Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentCulture = CultureInfo.CreateSpecificCulture(culture);
Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentUICulture = new CultureInfo(culture);

But if the culture in the session is null then this code will crash. I think that the line if (culture.Length > 0) Culture = culture; should be something like
if (culture.Length > 0) culture = DefaultCulture; where DefaultCulture defines some culture that is used when no culture is found in the session.

Or maybe I miss something Smile

btw: the article is small, precise, clear - just as I like them - good work.

-^-^-^-^-^-
no risk no funk ................... please vote ------>

Re: Question about Code (possible bug)

uliderknecht

8:29 8 Nov '07

Hello! Yes you are right! I corrected this in the example above.. Thanks mate!
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Re: Question about Code (possible bug)

Urs Enzler

21:17 8 Nov '07

You're welcome. And by the way, you corrected it the way I meant it, I guess my post was a bit confusing - at least it was to me, when I read it now -^-^-^-^-^-^-^-^-^-^-^- no code is free of bugs
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Perfect

xiangzi_camel

22:17 17 Jun '07

Thanks for your solutions!
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Good article.

phucrobe

23:36 16 May '07

Good article. Thanks. Robe
Sign In·View Thread·PermaLink	5.00/5 (1 vote)

Re: Good article.

roundass

9:05 7 May '08

how would you do this in c#? <asp:label id="someLabel" runat="server" text=""><![CDATA[<%$ Resources:someResource %>]]>" /> thanks
Sign In·View Thread·PermaLink	1.00/5 (1 vote)

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