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Resource File With One String Table

One of the simplest approaches to localization is to use a resource file with only one string table. There is almost no additional coding required since resource file support is built into Visual Basic. Each language is allocated a block of string that fall within a specific range of resource ID numbers. A typical project might allocate blocks of 10,000 strings per language. For example, English might be for ID numbers 0-9,999, Italian for 10,000-19,999 and German for 20,000-39,999. A language offset variable can be used to index into the appropriate block of strings as shown below:


              lBlockOffset = 20000  'Select German strings.
          sMsg = LoadResString(ID + lBlockOffset)

Advantages

Very simple design approach.
Language can be changed at runtime without rebooting.

Disadvantages

One resource file contains all languages, so your EXE file can become rather large if many languages are supported.
Any changes to translated strings requires a recompile and re-release.
Product release must wait until all translations have been completed.

Microsoft demonstrates this approach with their ATM.VBP project that can be found in the source code examples included with Visual Basic 6.0. The resource file from this project makes the strategy obvious. In this example, the block offset variable would be set to 80 in order to select the German strings.


16	Welcome
17	Please enter your pin number:
18	Please choose an account:
19	Checking account
20	Savings Account
21	Please enter an amount:
22	OK
23	Your transaction is being processed...
24	Thank you for using our ATM
25	The following amount will be withdraw from your:
26	US Dollars


48	Bienvenue
49	Veuillez entrer votre code:
50	Veuillez choisir un compte:
51	Compte ch�que
52	Compte �pargne
53	Veuillez entrer le montant:
54	OK
55	Votre transaction est en cours de traitement...
56	Merci d'avoir utilis� notre guichet automatique de banque
57	Le montant suivant va �tre d�bit� de votre :
58	Francs Fran�ais


80	Willkommen
81	Bitte geben Sie Ihre Geheimnummer ein:
82	Bitte w�hlen Sie ein Konto aus:
83	Girokonto
84	Sparbuch
85	Bitte geben Sie einen Betrag ein:
86	OK
87	Ihr Auftrag wird bearbeitet...
88	Vielen Dank da� Sie unseren Geldautomaten verwendet haben.
89	Die folgende Summe wird abgebucht von Ihrem:
90	DM


112	Benvenuti
113	Digitare il proprio codice segreto:
114	Scegliere il tipo di conto:
115	Conto corrente
116	Libretto di risparmio
117	Digitare la cifra richiesta:
118	Attendere
119	La vostra operazione � in corso di esecuzione...
120	Grazie e arrivederci
121	La seguente cifra verr� prelevata dal vostro:
122	Lire Italiane


144	Bienvenido
145	Por favor, ingrese su n�mero de identificaci�n secreto:
146	Por favor, elija una cuenta:
147	Conto corrente
148	Cuenta de ahorros
149	Por favor, ingrese un importe:
150	Aceptar
151	Su transacci�n se est� procesando...
152	Le agradecemos que haya usado nuestro cajero autom�tico
153	La siguiente cantidad ser� retirada de su:
154	Pesetas

NOTE: This table is copyright protected by Microsoft.

Page last updated: May 03, 2003