Localization With Database MVC - sql

Question

I am working on a multilingual ASP.NET MVC application (MVC4).
I want to make my resource file strings to be editable at runtime without recompiling the application and without app pool recycling And it doesn't look possible with .resx file, so I migrate to store string resources in Database.
I have to Get Each Label/String Resource From Database, so there will be more hits to database for each request. How to fix that?
I have googled around and someone suggests to load the resource in a dictionary and store it as application variable, at login/Sign In page and use that dictionary as resource instead of database hit.
I am confused, what will be effective approach.Can someone guide me in right direction to avoid more database hits?
Any help/suggestions will be highly appreciated.
Thanks

Answer 1

I ran into the same concerns using .resx files for localization. They just did not work well when the persons doing the translation were not programmers. Now, we have a translation page in our admin area. Works great.
One area which we still don't have a good solution for are the data annotations, which still use the .resx files. I have trimmed the source below to remove any references to our actual database structures or tables.
There is a fallback to using the underlying .resx file, if an entry does not exist in the database. If there is not an entry in the .resx file, I split the word whenever a capitol letter is found ( CamelSpace is a string extension method ).
Lastly, depending on your implementation, you may need to remove the context caching, especially if you are caching out of process.
A few examples of usage:
#LanguageDb.Translate("Enter your first name below","FirstNamePrompt")
#LanguageDb.Me.FirstName
#String
.Format(LanguageDb
.Translate(#"You can be insured for
{0} down and {1} payments of {2}"),
Model.Down,Model.NumPayments,
Model.InstallmentAmount)
public class LanguageDb : DynamicObject
{
public static dynamic Me = new LanguageDb();
private LanguageDb() { }
public static string Translate(string englishPhrase, string resourceCode = null)
{
return GetTranslation(englishPhrase, resourceCode) ?? englishPhrase;
}
public override bool TryGetMember(GetMemberBinder binder, out object result)
{
result = GetTranslation(binder.Name);
return true;
}
private static string GetTranslation(string resourceName, string resourceCode = null)
{
resourceCode = resourceCode ?? resourceName;
if (resourceCode.Contains(" ") || resourceCode.Length > 50)
{
resourceCode = resourceName.GetHashCode().ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture);
}
var lang = (string)HttpContext.Current.Request.RequestContext.RouteData.Values["lang"] ?? "en";
// cache entries for an hour
var result = Get(subagent + "_" + lang + "_" + resourceCode, 3600, () =>
{
// cache a datacontext object for 30 seconds.
var context = Get("_context", 30, () => new YourDataContext()) as YourDataContext;
var translation = context.Translations.FirstOrDefault(row => row.lang == lang && row.Code == resourceCode);
if (translation == null)
{
translation = new Lookup {
Code = resourceCode,
lang = lang,
Value = Language.ResourceManager.GetString(resourceName, Language.Culture)
?? resourceName.CamelSpace()
};
context.Translations.Add(translation);
context.SaveChanges();
}
return translation.Value;
});
return result;
}
public override bool TrySetMember(SetMemberBinder binder, object value)
{
// ignore this
return true;
}
public static T Get<T>(string cacheId, int secondsToCache, Func<T> getItemCallback) where T : class
{
T item = HttpRuntime.Cache.Get(cacheId) as T;
if (item == null)
{
item = getItemCallback();
if (secondsToCache > 0)
{
HttpRuntime.Cache.Insert(
cacheId, item, null, Cache.NoAbsoluteExpiration,
new TimeSpan(0, 0, secondsToCache), CacheItemPriority.Normal, null);
}
else
{
HttpRuntime.Cache.Insert(cacheId, item);
}
}
return item;
}
}