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Apache Tiles - Framework - Tiles Localization

Localization support

Customizing pages for different locales in a common practice: in real-world websites you can see different sites for different languages and countries.

It can be a matter of changing the layout (for example, in Arab countries the menu should stay on the right, instead of the left), or providing alternate content.

Creating localized definitions

Localization is immediately available. To use the benefits of localization you have to create different Tiles definition files for each locale you want to support: it's simply a matter of appending the locale code at the end of the file name (just like .properties files in resource bundles).

For example, if you have the tiles-defs.xml file and you want to support French and Italian locale, you have to create at least three files:

tiles-defs.xml
tiles-defs_fr.xml
tiles-defs_it.xml

You can also distinguish between different languages in different country. So if you want to distinguish between British English and American English, you can create these files:

tiles-defs_en_GB.xml
tiles-defs_en_US.xml

and so on.

Inheritance between localizations

If you want to support different locales, you don't have to rewrite all the definitions, but only those that differ from the main definitions file. In other words, locale-specific definition files contains the "overrides" to the default definitions.

For example, suppose that the following definition is declared in tiles-defs.xml:

<definition name="myapp.homepage" template="/layouts/classic.jsp">
  <put-attribute name="title" value="Tiles tutorial homepage" />
  <put-attribute name="header" value="/tiles/banner.jsp" />
  <put-attribute name="menu" value="/tiles/common_menu.jsp" />
  <put-attribute name="body" value="myapp.homepage.body" />
  <put-attribute name="footer" value="/tiles/credits.jsp" />
</definition>

<definition name="myapp.homepage.body" template="/layouts/three_rows.jsp">
  <put-attribute name="one" value="/tiles/headlines.jsp" />
  <put-attribute name="two" value="/tiles/topics.jsp" />
  <put-attribute name="one" value="/tiles/comments.jsp" />
</definition>

In tiles-defs_it.xml there is a new declaration of myapp.homepage definition:

<definition name="myapp.homepage" template="/layouts/classic.jsp">
  <put-attribute name="title" value="Pagina iniziale del tutorial di Tiles" />
  <put-attribute name="header" value="/tiles/banner.jsp" />
  <put-attribute name="menu" value="/tiles/common_menu.jsp" />
  <put-attribute name="body" value="myapp.homepage.body" />
  <put-attribute name="footer" value="/tiles/credits.jsp" />
</definition>

Using "it" locale, the title will be different from the default, while the rest remains the same.

Notice that the myapp.homepage.body definition is the one defined in the default definitions file: you still can reference to the default definitions, both when composing and when extending.

You can also override a definition that is extended. In this case, when resolving inheritance, the overridden definition will be taken as a basis. For example, if in tiles-defs.xml there are the following definitions:

<definition name="myapp.page.common" template="/layouts/classic.jsp">
  <put-attribute name="header" value="/tiles/banner.jsp" />
  <put-attribute name="menu" value="/tiles/common_menu.jsp" />
  <put-attribute name="footer" value="/tiles/credits.jsp" />
</definition>

<definition name="myapp.bugs" extends="myapp.page.common">
  <put-attribute name="title" value="Bugs" />
  <put-attribute name="body" value="myapp.homepage.body" />
</definition>

If in tiles-defs_it.xml you define the following definition:

<definition name="myapp.page.common" template="/layouts/classic.jsp">
  <put-attribute name="header" value="/tiles/banner_it.jsp" />
  <put-attribute name="menu" value="/tiles/common_menu_it.jsp" />
  <put-attribute name="footer" value="/tiles/credits_it.jsp" />
</definition>

The myapp.bugs will extend the latter definition, and not the default! This is useful if you want to change an abstract definition for a locale, without redefining all the definitions.