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Language Class

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The Language Class provides functions to retrieve language files and lines of text for purposes of internationalization.

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In your CodeIgniter system folder you'll find one called language containing sets of language files. You can create -your own language files as needed in order to display error and other messages in other languages.

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Language files are typically stored in your system/language directory. Alternately you can create a folder called language inside -your application folder and store them there. CodeIgniter will look first in your application/language -directory. If the directory does not exist or the specified language is not located there CI will instead look in your global -system/language folder.

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Note: Each language should be stored in its own folder. For example, the English files are located at: -system/language/english

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Creating Language Files

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Language files must be named with _lang.php as the file extension. For example, let's say you want to create a file -containing error messages. You might name it: error_lang.php

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Within the file you will assign each line of text to an array called $lang with this prototype:

- -$lang['language_key'] = "The actual message to be shown"; - -

Note: It's a good practice to use a common prefix for all messages in a given file to avoid collisions with -similarly named items in other files. For example, if you are creating error messages you might prefix them with error_

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$lang['error_email_missing'] = "You must submit an email address";

-$lang['error_url_missing'] = "You must submit a URL";

-$lang['error_username_missing'] = "You must submit a username";

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Loading A Language File

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In order to fetch a line from a particular file you must load the file first. Loading a language file is done with the following code:

- -$this->lang->load('filename', 'language'); - -

Where filename is the name of the file you wish to load (without the file extension), and language -is the language set containing it (ie, english). If the second parameter is missing, the default language set in your -application/config/config.php file will be used.

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Fetching a Line of Text

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Once your desired language file is loaded you can access any line of text using this function:

- -$this->lang->line('language_key'); - -

Where language_key is the array key corresponding to the line you wish to show.

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Note: This function simply returns the line. It does not echo it for you.

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Using language lines as form labels

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This feature has been deprecated from the language library and moved to the lang() function of the Language helper.

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Auto-loading Languages

If you find that you need a particular language globally throughout your application, you can tell CodeIgniter to auto-load it during system initialization. This is done by opening the application/config/autoload.php file and adding the language(s) to the autoload array.

CodeIgniter User Guide Version 2.0.3

Language Class

Creating Language Files

Loading A Language File

Fetching a Line of Text

Using language lines as form labels

Auto-loading Languages