Let a user change their portal language graphically

September 27, 2006 | 8 Views |

Michael Nicholls

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We’re going to make a couple of portal components to allow for dynamic language selection of the portal language. Of course, this assumes you have translated your portal content into the appropriate languages! To keep it simple, this example will limit itself to French, English and German, but the logic can be extended.

Because it’s going to be graphic based, first find some suitable image files to display to the user. Using Google images and searching for flags gave me the ones I use here:

We need to put these into our developer studio project – I keep mine under dist/images/mimes.

Our first component, which I have called PickLanguage, is used to display the images as anchored links that will then invoke the second component.

Here’s the code:

package com.sap.anz;import com.sapportals.portal.prt.component.*;public class PickLanguage extends AbstractPortalComponent { public void doContent( IPortalComponentRequest request, IPortalComponentResponse response) { String href = “/irj/servlet/prt/portal/prtroot/DynamicRole.ChangeLanguage?language=”; String imageURL = request.getWebResourcePath() + “/images/mimes/”; response.write( “”); response.write( “”); response.write( “”); }}

The href string points to my portal component, so if I change the name of the PAR file or component, I need to change this to the appropriate value.

The second component, which I have called ChangeLanguage, sets the user’s language and then launches the portal again…

package com.sap.anz; import java.util.Locale;import com.sap.security.api.IGroupFactory;import com.sap.security.api.IRole;import com.sap.security.api.IRoleFactory;import com.sap.security.api.IUser;import com.sap.security.api.IUserFactory;import com.sap.security.api.IUserMaint;import com.sap.security.api.UMFactory;import com.sapportals.portal.prt.component.AbstractPortalComponent;import com.sapportals.portal.prt.component.IPortalComponentRequest;import com.sapportals.portal.prt.component.IPortalComponentResponse;public class ChangeLanguage extends AbstractPortalComponent{ public void doContent(IPortalComponentRequest request, IPortalComponentResponse response) { String language = request.getParameter(“language”); IUserFactory userFact = UMFactory.getUserFactory(); boolean oksofar = true; IUser me = request.getUser(); Locale myLocale = me.getLocale(); boolean restart = false; if (oksofar && language!=null) { try { IUserMaint modUser = userFact.getMutableUser(me.getUid()); if (language.equalsIgnoreCase(“english”)) modUser.setLocale(Locale.ENGLISH); if (language.equalsIgnoreCase(“french”)) modUser.setLocale(Locale.FRENCH); if (language.equalsIgnoreCase(“german”)) modUser.setLocale(Locale.GERMAN); modUser.commit(); modUser.save(); restart = true; } catch (Exception e) { response.write(“Problem setting language: “+e.getMessage()); oksofar = false; } } if (restart) { response.write(“”); response.write(“window.top.location.href=\”/irj/portal\””); response.write(“”); } }}

Make an iView that launches the first component and give it to a portal role, and you should be finished.

As a caveat, you must have an environment in which users can change their portal language. If they can’t do this, then you need to find another way to achieve the dynamic selection.

Good luck!

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21 Comments

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Prem Mascarenhas October 19, 2006 at 12:48 am

An excellent example.
Very good for a flexible user development to deal with loacales.
Thanks Michael.

like (0)
Kai Chalker January 31, 2007 at 8:23 am

Hi,

Is there a requirement for a portalapps.xml for this deployment. If you have a copy of this deployment is is possible to send it to me.

kai@kaiandrachel.co.uk

Many thanks….

like (0)
1. Michael Nicholls Post authorJanuary 31, 2007 at 12:32 pm
  
  Yep, you always need a portalapp.xml file for a portal component to work. NWDS will make one for you, and the default worked for me.
  
  The important bit is:
  
  Cheers
  
  like (0)
  1. Sonali M S November 19, 2007 at 12:23 pm
    
    Hello Michael,How to solve the issue …?
    
    like (0)
    1. Michael Nicholls Post authorNovember 19, 2007 at 12:46 pm
      
      Unfortunately the Java standard set of locales does not include constants SPANISH or POLISH (or SWEDISH or…) You might be able to use something like:
      
      private static Locale POLISH = new Locale(“pl”, “PL”);
      
      etc
      
      like (0)
      1. Sonali M S December 3, 2007 at 1:27 pm
        
        Hi, Thanks Michael, your blog really helped me a lot…I am able to change the language of the portal. The only problem now remains is , the language changes for all the areas except fot the content area. There the contes are still displayed in English. Whereas teh same thing when done through the SAP personalize->language modify, after relogging into the portal, the content in the content area ia also changed to the newly selected language. Is there any workaround for this?
        
        Thanks in advance.
        
        like (0)
        
        vaishali dhayalan July 21, 2009 at 9:28 pm
        
        Hi Michael,Sonali,
        
        please can you tell me how you set the locale to spanish… I am unable to set the locale.
        
        I created a new locale as follows:
        
        private static Locale SPANISH = new Locale(“es”, “ES”);
        
        and then set this
        if (language.equalsIgnoreCase(“spanish”))
        modUser.setLocale(SPANISH);
        
        but its not setting the locale to spanish.
        Please can you let me know how to check this. I have a requirement to change the locale to spanish.
        
        Require help here.
        
        Regards,
        Vaishali
        
        like (0)
        
        Michael Nicholls Post authorJuly 21, 2009 at 9:38 pm
        
        Make sure the ?language parameter is set to spanish when you click the Spanish flag…
        
        like (0)
        
        vaishali dhayalan July 21, 2009 at 10:16 pm
        
        Hi Micheal,
        
        I have added the following code in PickLanguage.java
        
        response.write(
        ““); and also added a es.gif in imagesmimes folder
        
        when i click on the image in the url is
        
        http://ud1sap01pd1.bhpb.internal:50000/irj/servlet/prt/portal/prtroot/dynamicrole.changelanguage?language=spanish
        
        But still my user language remains english. The language changes only for the ones mentioned in the log.
        
        Please can you let me know where i am going wrong.
        
        Regards,
        Vaishali
        
        like (0)
        
        vaishali dhayalan July 21, 2009 at 10:16 pm
        
        Hi Micheal,
        
        I have added the following code in PickLanguage.java
        
        response.write(
        ““); and also added a es.gif in imagesmimes folder
        
        when i click on the image in the url is
        
        http://ud1sap01pd1.bhpb.internal:50000/irj/servlet/prt/portal/prtroot/dynamicrole.changelanguage?language=spanish
        
        But still my user language remains english. The language changes only for the ones mentioned in the blog.
        
        Please can you let me know where i am going wrong.
        
        Regards,
        Vaishali
        
        like (0)
        
        Michael Nicholls Post authorJuly 22, 2009 at 11:55 am
        
        I would suggest putting in some extra response.write statements to make sure you are really going through the correct logic path in ChangeLanguage…
        
        like (0)
        
        vaishali dhayalan July 21, 2009 at 9:29 pm
        
        Hi Michael,Sonali,
        
        please can you tell me how you set the locale to spanish… I am unable to set the locale.
        
        I created a new locale as follows:
        
        private static Locale SPANISH = new Locale(“es”, “ES”);
        
        and then set this
        if (language.equalsIgnoreCase(“spanish”))
        modUser.setLocale(SPANISH);
        
        But unfortunately the portal language is not set to Spanish.
        Please can you let me know how to check this. I have a requirement to change the locale to spanish.
        
        Require help here.
        
        Regards,
        Vaishali
        
        like (0)
Nancy Lam February 25, 2007 at 12:30 am

Excelent blog .If you have a copy of this deployment is it possible to send it to me
nancylam01@yahoo.com

like (0)
1. Michael Nicholls Post authorFebruary 25, 2007 at 12:49 pm
  
  Hi Nancy
  
  I don’t have a par file for this – it ios a cut and paste from a larger set of code…
  
  Cheers
  
  like (0)
Jorge Dacev December 21, 2007 at 4:55 am

Hi, I’ve got this error when I click on a link to change the language:

com.sapportals.portal.prt.runtime.PortalRuntimeException: iView not found: DynamicRole.ChangeLanguage

this is the url:
/irj/servlet/prt/portal/prtroot/DynamicRole.ChooseLanguage?language=english

or

/irj/servlet/prt/portal/prtroot/DynamicRole.ChooseLanguage?language=french

or

/irj/servlet/prt/portal/prtroot/DynamicRole.ChooseLanguage?language=spanish

I’ve got the ChangeLanguage.java class in the .par file

Thanks.

like (0)
1. Michael Nicholls Post authorDecember 21, 2007 at 10:14 am
  
  Hi Jorge
  
  I’m not sure why the component DynamicRole.ChooseLanguage is being invoked. It should be DynamicRole.ChangeLanguage, as this is the name of your Java file.
  
  Is it possible you mistyped the name of the href variable in Pick.java?
  
  Cheers
  
  like (0)
Jorge Dacev December 21, 2007 at 10:14 am

Use:
/irj/portal/prtroot/DynamicRole.ChangeLanguage?language=english

Instead:
“/irj/servlet/prt/portal/prtroot/DynamicRole.ChangeLanguage?language=english

like (0)
1. Michael Nicholls Post authorDecember 21, 2007 at 10:16 am
  
  We were posting at the same time!
  
  like (0)
vaishali dhayalan July 21, 2009 at 7:41 pm

Hi Micheal,

I am getting the follwing error:

com.sapportals.portal.prt.runtime.PortalRuntimeException: iView not found: DynamicRole.PickLanguage

Please can you guide me regarding this.

like (0)
1. Michael Nicholls Post authorJuly 21, 2009 at 8:27 pm
  
  What did you call your NWDS project? I called mine DynamicRole, which is why the URL is DynamicRole.PickLanguage. Replace DynamicRole with your project nsme and see what happens.
  
  like (0)
  1. india mom September 18, 2012 at 7:57 am
    
    Hi Michael,
    
    I have similar requirement of creating links for different languages in masthead area. Can you give detail code.
    
    like (0)