1. What is Multilang?
Multilang is a multiple languages plugin for IncPlugins.
2. Multilang installation
Download the latest Multilang release. It comes with IncPlugins Pro. Unzip it to any temporary directory. Copy multilang.php to your IncPlugins directory. Add the plugin include line to the IncPlugins settings file settings.php.
3. Using Multilang
3.1. Multilingual Methods
Multilang supports two methods of organize multilingual web sites:
- Multiple files (one file per a language)
- One file for all languages
Any localized version file name should have a form:
<file name>.<lang>.<file extension>
Here lang is a standard ISO 639 language code like: de, fr, it, ru.
Examples:
index.fr.php index.de.php index.ru.php
Your localized pages must be placed in the same directory.
3.2. Languages Set
To specify a set of languages use variable $multilang_list. It contains a string of ,-separated language codes. Example: en,de,fr.
Multilang will use this list to find a right version of your page to show. If user’s language is not supported, a first name from this list is used as a default language. But, if this list contains English, this language will be selected as default even it is located not in the head of the list.
Multilang also supports ex-USSR languages. It selects Russian as default language for ex-USSR languages, because users from ex-USSR know Russian better than English.
You can disable this feature using this setting:
$multilang_exUSSR = false;
Do not forget to specify the languages set in inc.s.php file. Example:
... include_once $inc_dir.'multilang.php'; $multilang_list = 'en,fr,de,es'; ...
3.3. Getting and Setting User’s Language
Multilang uses these sources to calculate user’s language:
- HTTP Get parameter ?lang=[code]
- Cookie value lang
- HTTP_ACCEPT_LANGUAGE
The result is stored into IncPlugins variable $lang. If the user’s language is different from a cookie value, the cookie value will be replaced. To set user’s language to the cookie, use HTTP Get parameter in your link. Example:
<a href="page.php?lang=fr">French Version</a>
There is a special value default. It clears user’s browser language cookie.
Multilang also sets these variables:
- $html_lang if it is empty (default value)
- $charset if it is empty (default value)
3.4. Charset Management
Multilang uses a charset value from array $multilang_charset[$lang]. Multilang has predefined variables for most popular languages. But if they are not suit you or absent, create your own values. Example:
$multilang_charset['ru'] = 'windows-1251';
3.5. Language Names
You can get a language name, using this code:
$current_language = $multilang_name[$lang];
Multilang has predefined variables for most popular languages. But if they are not suit you or absent, create your own values. Example:
$multilang_name['it'] = 'Italian';
3.6. Language Controls
You can use these controls in your pages:
- Language selection combobox
- Language text menu
Use these functions to insert the controls:
- function multilang_combobox($show_code = false)
- function multilang_list($separator = ' | ', $show_code = false)
Here are:
- $show_code — true if you want to show language codes instead of names.
- $separator — list separator HTML code.
3.7. Multilingual File
You can mix multiple languages in the same web page. Example:
<?if ($lang == 'fr'): ?> France version text <?elseif ($lang == 'de'): ?> German version text <?elseif ($lang == 'ru'): ?> Russian version text <?else: ?> English version text <?endif?>