How to localise Menu bar ?

einhugur

How do we localise the menu bar ?

Doing this little test the App.Opening event does nothing at all:


App.MenuBar.FindItem("aboutItem").Text = "Test"

Garry

App.MenuBar and the window’s MenuBar are separate instances, even when they come from the same menu design. On macOS, the active window supplies the visible menu captions, including About, so changing the App instance doesn’t change that window’s menu.

Try putting this in the window’s Opening event:

Self.MenuBar.FindItem("aboutItem").Text = "Test"

For localisation, replace "Test" with your resource lookup:

Self.MenuBar.FindItem("aboutItem").Text = Localise("menu.about")

You’ll also want to translate App.MenuBar for the macOS menu shown when no windows are open.

While investigating this, I found a separate macOS refresh bug: changing captions after the native menu has been installed doesn’t reliably update the displayed menu, particularly items such as About. I’ve logged that here.

Setting the window’s captions in Opening happens before its native menu is installed, so that is the approach to use for initial localisation.

Garry

The fix will be in the next release.

einhugur

This leads to next question.....

How do I localize the Edit menu ? The edit menu seems not even editable.

And how would I add to the Edit menu since its not editable ?

rgb

einhugur

Hi,
I use this translate to french locale by example

For i As Integer = 0 To Self.MenuBar.MenuCount - 1

  Var mn As Menu = Self.MenuBar.MenuAt(i)

  If mn.text = "Edit" Then

    mn.text = "Édition"

    For i1 As Integer = 0 To mn.ItemCount - 1

      Var it As MenuItem = mn.ItemAt(i1)

      Select Case it.text

        Case "Undo"

          it.text = "Annnuler"

        Case "Redo"

          it.text = "Rétablir"

        Case "Cut"

          it.text = "Couper"

        Case "Copy"

          it.text = "Copier"

        Case "Paste"

          it.text = "Coller"

        Case "Select All"

          it.text = "Tout Sélectionner"

      End Select

    Next

  End If

Next

einhugur

rgb

But don't we need to be able to edit the Edit menu also ? I mean......most apps add something there.

rgb

einhugur

Ok, garry work for this 🙂

Feedback 1884

Garry

Yes, the Edit menu should be editable. I’ve now implemented this for the next release.

You’ll be able to edit the standard Edit menu in the designer like any other menu: add commands, submenus and separators, reorder items, change captions and shortcuts, and attach handlers to your own commands.

The standard items have an Action setting that preserves their built-in behaviour independently of their captions. For example, translating “Copy” to “Copier” keeps its automatic copy behaviour.

I’ve also added a Localisation Key field for menu captions. You can choose an existing project string key or create one from the inspector, then edit its translations in Project Settings > Localisation. These bindings apply automatically to both application and window menus.

Existing projects’ standard Edit menus will become editable automatically. New desktop projects will still include all the working standard Edit commands and their usual shortcuts.

Thanks @rgb for sharing the workaround for the current release.

einhugur

Garry Its really nice to get the localization key