i18npack

Keeps multiple i18n files in a single YAML file.

Most tools that work with i18n data expect translations to be separated by language. i18npack allows you to keep translations for all languages in the same file so you can glance at all translations without switching to another file. It's based on js-yaml and thus only supports YAML files as source.

Installation

npm install i18npack

Usage

var i18npack = require('i18npack');
 
// Use a glob pattern to specify files
i18npack.generate('translations/**/*.yaml', options);
 
// ...or pass an array of file names. options is optional.
i18npack.generate(['file1.yaml', 'file2.yaml']);
 
// Set default options if you don't want to pass it each time.
i18npack.settings.languages = ['en'. 'fr'];
 
// ...and you can reset options later if necessary.
i18npack.reset();

i18npack supports glob patterns. See glob documentation.

Examples

Given these two source files and option { languages: ['en', 'fr'] },

bio.yaml

name: "John Smith"
job: !t
  - "engineer"
  - "ingénieur"
 

pages.yaml

index:
  pageTitle: !t
    - "My Website"
    - "Mon site web"
  url: "http://www.mywebsite.com"
 

they are transformed into:

en.json

{
  "bio": {
    "name": "John Smith",
    "job": "engineer"
  },
  "pages": {
    "index": {
      "pageTitle": "My Website",
      "url": "http://www.mywebsite.com"
    }
  },
  "__lang__": "en",
  "__langs__": ["en", "fr"]
}

fr.json

{
  "bio": {
    "name": "John Smith",
    "job": "ingénieur"
  },
  "pages": {
    "index": {
      "pageTitle": "Mon site web",
      "url": "http://www.mywebsite.com"
    }
  },
  "__lang__": "fr",
  "__langs__": ["en", "fr"]
}

Note that the __lang__ and __langs__ are added automatically, but if these placeholders are already taken, then they are not overwritten. Also, you can choose to not include them by default by setting includeLangDetails in the options to false.

Language Keys

If there are many languages, it may be convenient to prefix each translation by a language code. These codes need to be the same ones specified in options. Also, the order is not important, but it is not possible to key only some translations.

greetingText: !t
  - en: Welcome!
  - fr: Bienvenue!
  - da: Velkommen!
  - ja: ようこそ！

i18npack YAML Types

i18npack uses several built-in cusyom YAML types to help you organize strings better.

!t

Takes a list of scalars and selects one that corresponds to the current language being generated. The order of the items in the list determine the language, and it corresponds to the order defined in the languages option.

See examples above.

!struct

Takes a specified JSON schema and validates a block against the Draft v7 schema using ajv. To specifiy a schema, use _schema in the source and specify the name of the file containing it. Use jsonValidatorOptions to pass options to the validator (See their documentation for available options). If you are unfamilier with JSON schema Draft v7, try using http://jsonschema.net to generate it.

book.yaml

book: !struct
  _schema: book.json
  title: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
  auothor: Lewis Carroll

book.json

{
  "$schema": "http://json-schema.org/draft-07/schema#",
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "title": {
      "type": "string"
    },
    "auothor": {
      "type": "string"
    }
  },
  "required": [
    "title",
    "auothor"
  ]
}

!extend

Reads a YAML file and _.extends the current block with the file content.

book: !extend
  _base: book.yaml
  published: 1865

Result:

{
  "book": {
    "title": "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland",
    "auothor": "Lewis Carroll",
    "published": 1856
  }
}

Custom YAML Types

You can also specify your own YAML types. See js-yaml documentation for more details.

var options = {
  customTypes: {
    '!greet scalar': function(value) {
      return 'Hello, ' + value + '!';
    },
    '!max sequence': function(values) {
      return Math.max.apply(null, values);
    }
  }
};
 
i18npack.generate('test.yaml', options);

test.yaml

msg: !greet John Smith
maxValue: !max
  - 10
  - 5
  - 21
  - 5
foo: !!str 123
bar: 123

Result:

{
  "test": {
    "msg": "Hello, John Smith!",
    "maxValue": 21,
    "foo": "123",
    "bar": 123
  }
}

Using Templates

It is possible to reference a value from any source files so you don't need to repeat the same values in many places. JSON Query is supported in i18npack to make this possible. To use it, enclose the query in the {{ }} delimiter, and wrap it inside double quotes:

bio.yaml

name: "John Smith",
homepage: "{{ pages.index.url }}"

pages.yaml

index:
  url: "http://www.mywebsite.com"

Result:

bio:
  name: "John Smith"
  homepage: "http://www.mywebsite.com"
pages:
  index:
    url: "http://www.mywebsite.com"

Handling Empty Strings

By default, empty strings are not included in the output. To change this behavior, use the allowEmptyTranslations option.

Options

You can override the default options as follows so you don't need to pass the option object each time. If you need to reset changes, use i18npack.reset().

i18npack.settings.dest = 'data/translations';

languages

Type: array Default: ['en']

An array of supported languages.

dest

Type: string Default: '.'

The path of a destination directory.

schemaDir

Type: string Default: '.'

The directory containing schemas for source files.

includeLangDetails

Type: boolean Default: true

If true, the __lang__ and __langs__ properties will be added to the output files.

jsonValidatorOptions

Type: object Default: {}

The options passed to the JSON validator.

delimiter

Type: RegExp object Default: /{{([\s\S]+?)}}/g

The delimiter used for processing templates. It must have one regex group and the global flag g.

customTypes

Type: object Default: {}

An object of key-value pairs containing custom YAML types. See js-yaml documentation for more details.

strict

Type: boolean Default: false

If true, an error is thrown if the number of provided translations is less than the number of the supported languages.

allowEmptyTranslations

Type: boolean Default: false

If true, empty translations are included in the output.

ext

Type: string Default: '.json'

The file extension of output files.

mergeFilesAtRoot

Type: boolean Default: false

If true, the output of each file will be merged at the root. Otherwise, each file is namespaced by its file name. Note that if there are keys with the same name coming from multiple files, an error will be thrown.