tap-i18n

Developing Meteor's Internationalization Build Plugin

By Daniel Chcouri / theosp.github.io

Internationalization - i18n

tap-i18n Demo

tap-i18n - i18n for Meteor

• Readable Syntax
• Advanced i18n
• All Encompassing
• Transparent Namespacing
• Ready to Scale

Readable Syntax

{
    "click": "Click Here"
}

Click Here

Advanced i18n - sprintf

{
    "hello": "Hello %s, your last visit was on: %s"
}

Hello Daniel, your last visit was on: 2014-05-22

Advanced i18n - Named Variables

{
    "hello": "Hello __user_name__, your last visit was on: %s"
}

Hello Daniel, your last visit was on: 2014-05-22

Advanced i18n - Singular/Plural + Count

{
    "inbox_status": "__username__, You have a new message (inbox last checked %s)",
    "inbox_status_plural": "__username__, You have __count__ new messages (last checked %s)"
}

Daniel, You have a new message (inbox last checked 2014-05-22)
Chris, You have 4 new messages (last checked 2014-05-22)

Advanced i18n - Context

{
    "actors_count": "There is one actor in the movie",
    "actors_count_male": "There is one actor in the movie",
    "actors_count_female": "There is one actress in the movie",
    "actors_count_plural": "There are __count__ actors in the movie",
    "actors_count_male_plural": "There are __count__ actors in the movie",
    "actors_count_female_plural": "There are __count__ actresses in the movie",
}

There is one actor in the movie
There are 2 actresses in the movie

Advanced i18n - Dialects Support

Auto fallback:

• Language dialect, if specified ("pt-BR")
• Base language ("pt")
• Base English ("en")

All Encompassing

• Projects developers' needs are not the same as package developers'.
• Tap-i18n provides specific tools for project and package developers.
• Total coverage and seamless integration into the Meteor package ecosystem.

Transparent Namespacing

Ready to Scale

• Translations are unified into a single JSON file per language that includes both package and project-level translations
• On-demand: translations are loaded only when they are needed
• 3rd Party CDN Support

Meteor Packages

• Meteor's units of reusability
• Simply a directory with a package.js file in it
• Explicitly list all of their source files and load order
• Have their own package namespace: variables used without var available on all the package's files

deps - package.js

Package.on_use(function (api) {
  api.export('Deps');
  api.add_files('deps.js');
  api.add_files('deprecated.js');
});

tap-i18n - package.js

Package.on_use(function (api) {
  api.use(["coffeescript", "underscore", "meteor"], ['server', 'client']);
  api.use(["http-methods"], 'server');
  api.use(["deps", "session", "jquery", "templating"], 'client');

  // load and init TAPi18next
  api.add_files('lib/tap_i18next/tap_i18next-1.7.3.js', 'client');
  api.export("TAPi18next");
  api.add_files('lib/tap_i18next/tap_i18next_init.js', 'client');

  // load TAPi18n
  api.add_files('lib/globals.js', ['client', 'server']);
  api.add_files('lib/tap_i18n/tap_i18n-common.coffee', 'server');

  // We use the bare option since we need TAPi18n in the package level
  // and coffee adds vars to all (so without bare all vars are in the
  // file level)
  api.add_files('lib/tap_i18n/tap_i18n-common.coffee', 'client',
                  {bare: true});

  api.add_files('lib/tap_i18n/tap_i18n-server.coffee', 'server');
  api.add_files('lib/tap_i18n/tap_i18n-client.coffee', 'client',
                  {bare: true});

  api.export("TAPi18n");
});

Meteor Build Plugins

• Allow us to perform special procedures for specific file types
• Allow us to generate js and css that will be part of the project build

Defined in package.js, but they are actually:

• Fully-fledged Meteor programs in their own right
• Have their own namespace, package dependencies, source files and npm requirements

Less Build Plugin

Package._transitional_registerBuildPlugin({
  name: "compileLess",
  use: [],
  sources: [
    'plugin/compile-less.js'
  ],
  npmDependencies: {"less": "1.6.1"}
});

Less Build Plugin

Plugin.registerSourceHandler("less", function (compileStep) {
  //
  // compilation code
  //

  compileStep.addStylesheet({
    path: compileStep.inputPath + ".css",
    data: css,
    sourceMap: sourceMap
  });
});;

// Register import.less files with the dependency watcher, without actually
// processing them. There is a similar rule in the stylus package.
Plugin.registerSourceHandler("import.less", function () {
  // Do nothing
});

// Backward compatibility with Meteor 0.7
Plugin.registerSourceHandler("lessimport", function () {});

tap-i18n Build Plugin

// Register our build plugin
Package._transitional_registerBuildPlugin({
  name: "compileI18n",
  use: ["coffeescript", "meteor", "simple-schema", "check", "templating"],
  sources: [
    'lib/globals.js',
    'lib/plugin/wrench.js',
    'lib/plugin/language_names.js',
    'lib/plugin/compile-i18n.coffee'
  ]
});

tap-i18n Handlers Registration

Plugin.registerSourceHandler "i18n", (compileStep) ->
  ...

Plugin.registerSourceHandler "package-tap.i18n", (compileStep) ->
  ...

Plugin.registerSourceHandler "project-tap.i18n", (compileStep) ->
  ...

Plugin.registerSourceHandler "i18n.json", (compileStep) ->
  ...

tap-i18n the Build Process

The Template Namespace Challenge

• All the templates in a meteor project are added to the same Template object
• Templates in the Template object don't indicate which package indroduced them
• How do you tell which package a template belongs to?

The Template Namespace Challenge

Package.on_use(function (api) {
  api.use(["tap-i18n"], ["client", "server"]);

  // You must load your package's package-tap.i18n before you load any
  // template
  api.add_files("package-tap.i18n", ["client", "server"]);

  // Templates loads (if any)

  // You must load the languages files after you load your templates -
  // otherwise the templates won't have the i18n capabilities (unless
  // you'll register them with tap-i18n yourself, see below).
  api.add_files([
    "i18n/en.i18n.json",
    "i18n/fr.i18n.json",
    "i18n/pt.i18n.json",
    "i18n/pt-br.i18n.json"
  ], ["client"]);
});

Build Plugins Pitfalls

• If you want to register a plugin for the xxx.a.b extension, you must first register a plugin for xxx.b
• Build plugins must be synchronous
• Clients refresh only if the build content changed

Testing Build Plugins with Configurable Build Options - Live Overview

Fork me on GitHub!

TAPevents/tap-i18n