Dynamic multilingual resource support for applications

• US 20060210026A1
• Filed: 03/18/2005
• Published: 09/21/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 03/18/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Duplessis, Jean-Pierre, Hanlon, William N., Gatta, Srivinas Raghu
• Granted Patent: US 7,757,227 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 379/88.50
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/454 Multi-language systems; Localisation; Internationalisation

Abstract

A download component queries a computer containing an application for requesting resources to determine languages associated with the computer. The download component then accesses the remote database and conducts a match between the queried languages on the computer and available languages in the database. The download component then downloads resources for each of the matched languages and a default language, such as English. A smart query module associated with the application on the computer is provided for choosing language resource files for the application. An algorithm is provided for choosing a language resource based upon user default settings and available resources, with a fall back to a default language, e.g., English.

Claims

1. A computer-readable medium having thereon computer-executable instructions for performing a method comprising:

for an application on a computer, accessing the computer to determine languages supported by the computer;

accessing a plurality of remote language resources, each of the language resources representing a set of resources relating to a language;

downloading a subset of the plurality in accordance with languages supported by the computer.

2. The computer-readable medium of claim 1, wherein the plurality is maintained in a remote database.

3. The computer-readable medium of claim 1, wherein each of the plurality comprises an extensible markup language file.

4. The computer-readable medium of claim 1, wherein the remote language resources comprises generic files for a language and sub-files of the generic file, each of the sub-files representing a regional preference for the language.

5. The computer-readable medium of claim 4, wherein, upon downloading the subset, for each language, the generic and sub-files are downloaded.

6. The computer-readable medium of claim 4, further comprising amalgamating the subset to form a query-able object.

7. The computer-readable medium of claim 1, further comprising amalgamating the subset to form a query-able object.

8. A computer-readable medium having thereon computer-executable instructions for performing a method comprising:

for an application on a computer, downloading a subset of a plurality of language resources in accordance with languages supported by the computer, each of the language resources representing a language; and

in response to a user request of display of an item, querying the subset for an appropriate language resource for display in accordance with language preference of the user.

9. The computer-readable medium of claim 8, wherein the language preference of the user comprises a user interface language of the computer.

10. The computer-readable medium of claim 9, wherein the language preference of the user comprises a regional preference setting on the computer.

11. The computer-readable medium of claim 10, wherein querying the subset comprises determining whether there is a neutral language for a first language resource associated with the user interface language of the computer and a second language resource associated with the regional preference setting on the computer, and

if there is a neutral language, selecting the second language resource, if available;

and

if there is not a neutral language, then selecting the first language resource, if available.

12. The computer-readable medium of claim 11, further comprising, if there is a neutral language, selecting a third language resource associated with the neutral language if the second language resource is not available.

13. The computer-readable medium of claim 12, further comprising, if there is a neutral language, selecting a fourth language resource associated with a default language if the third and second language resources are not available.

14. The computer-readable medium of claim 13, wherein the default language comprises English.

15. The computer-readable medium of claim 11, further comprising, if there is not a neutral language, selecting a third language resource associated with a default language if the first language resource is not available.

16. The computer-readable medium of claim 15, wherein the default language comprises English.

17. A computer-readable medium having thereon computer-executable instructions for performing a method comprising:

for an application on a computer, accessing a subset of a plurality of language resources, each of the language resources representing a language; and

in response to a user request of display of an item, querying the subset for an appropriate language resource for display in accordance with language preference of the user, wherein querying comprises determining whether there is a neutral language for a first language resource associated with the user interface language of the computer and a second language resource associated with the regional preference setting on the computer, and

if there is a neutral language, selecting the second language resource, if available; and

if there is not a neutral language, then selecting the first language resource, if available.

18. The computer-readable medium of claim 17, further comprising, if there is a neutral language, selecting a third language resource associated with the neutral language if the second language resource is not available.

19. The computer-readable medium of claim 18, further comprising, if there is a neutral language, selecting a fourth language resource associated with a default language if the third and second language resources are not available.

20. The computer-readable medium of claim 17, further comprising, if there is not a neutral language, selecting a third language resource associated with a default language if the first language resource is not available.