FastGettext

GetText but fast + simple + threadsave!

Setup

sudo gem install grosser-fast_gettext -s http://gems.github.com/

Tell Gettext where your mo-files lie:

#e.g. for locale/de/LC_MESSAGES/my_app.mo
FastGettext.add_text_domain('my_app',:path=>'locale')

Choose text domain, and locale for translation

FastGettext.text_domain = 'my_app'
FastGettext.available_locales = ['de','en','fr','en_US','en_UK'] # only allow these locales to be set (optional)
FastGettext.locale = 'de'

Start translating

include FastGettext
_('Car') == 'Auto'
_('not-found') == 'not-found'
s_('Namespace|no-found') == 'not-found'
n_('Axis','Axis',3) == 'Achsen' #German plural of Axis

Speed

FastGettext

small:
1.000000   0.130000   1.130000 (  1.132578)
mapped: 8620K    writeable/private: 5588K    shared: 28K

large:
1.060000   0.100000   1.160000 (  1.163962)
mapped: 8620K    writeable/private: 5588K    shared: 28K

GetText

small:
3.220000   0.260000   3.480000 (  3.478093)
mapped: 9036K    writeable/private: 6004K    shared: 28K

large:
3.280000   0.230000   3.510000 (  3.511891)
mapped: 9156K    writeable/private: 6124K    shared: 28K

Thread Safety and Rails

text_domains is not stored thread-save, so that they can be added inside the environment.rb,
and do not need to be readded for every thread (parsing takes time...).

Setting available_locales,text_domain or locale will not work inside the evironment.rb, since it runs in a different thread then e.g. controllers, so set them inside your application_controller.

#environment.rb after initializers
FastGettext.add_text_domain('accounting',:path=>'locale')
FastGettext.add_text_domain('frontend',:path=>'locale')
...

#application_controller.rb
class ApplicationController ...
  include FastGettext
  before_filter :set_locale
  def set_locale
    FastGettext.available_locales = ['de','en',...]
    FastGettext.text_domain = 'frontend'
    sessions[:locale] = I18n.locale = FastGettext.locale = params[:locale] || sessions[:locale] || 'en'
  end

#application_helper.rb
module ApplicationHelper
  include FastGettext
  ...

Try the gettext_i18n_rails plugin, it simplifies the setup.

Updating translations

ATM you have to use the original GetText to create and manage your po/mo-files.

Author

Mofile parsing from Masao Mutoh, see vendor/README

Michael Grosser
grosser.michael@gmail.com
Hereby placed under public domain, do what you want, just do not hold me accountable...