How to display all translation's fields in one form with globalize and rails 4

Question

How am I supposed to write the forms for my models where I'm using rails 4 and https://github.com/globalize/globalize for translations. i want to display all translations in one form like below example. i have found a solution here https://github.com/rilla/batch_translations but i don't know how do i implement this. is this "batch translation" a gem or what? and how can i install it.

<h1>Editing post</h1> 

   <% form_for(@post) do |f| %>
     <%= f.error_messages %>

     <h2>English (default locale)</h2>
     <p><%= f.text_field :title %></p>
     <p><%= f.text_field :teaser %></p>
     <p><%= f.text_field :body %></p>

     <hr/>

     <h2>Spanish translation</h2>
     <% f.globalize_fields_for :es do |g| %>
       <p><%= g.text_field :title %></p>
       <p><%= g.text_field :teaser %></p>
       <p><%= g.text_field :body %></p>
     <% end %>

     <hr/>

     <h2>French translation</h2>
     <% f.globalize_fields_for :fr do |g| %>
       <p><%= g.text_field :title %></p>
       <p><%= g.text_field :teaser %></p>
       <p><%= g.text_field :body %></p>
     <% end %>

   <% end %>

September

This is a module for extending FormBuilder you should be able to put it in the lib directory of your application and then require it where needed. – Nianiabi

ok let me check it and if works then you can add this as answer and i ll happily accept the answer – September

it shows an error "undefined method `globalize_translations' for" – September

That is telling me that the module was included correctly because it is calling globalize_fields_for but that it cannot find globalize_translations method for ''. Is that really all it says? Also you are missing = in your form_for should be <%= form_for(@post) do |f| %> this could be causing the issue. – Nianiabi

Answer 1

Have you considered something like this?

<%= form_for(@post) do |f| %>
     <%= f.error_messages %>

    <% [:en, :es, :fr].each do |lang| %>
      <h2><%= lang %> translation</h2>
      <% f.globalize_fields_for lang do |g| %>
        <% [:title, :teaser, :body].each do |field| %>
          <p><%= g.text_field field %></p>
        <% end %>
      <% end %>
      <hr/>
    <% end %>
<% end %>

You should be able to get those lists of regions and fields automatically. Then you only need a map of region to language name, like { en: 'English', es: 'Spanish', fr: 'French'} and you can output the proper language name instead of the region code. (This might already be available somewhere as well.)

Cataplasia

<p><%= g.text_field :title %></p> should be <p><%= g.text_field field %></p> – Nianiabi

i exactly copy ur code but it still says "undefined method `globalize_translations' for" – September

is this a separate solution for i18n or can it be used with combination of globalize. i am using only two languages :en and :ar and i can easily translate posts when locale is set but i want both forms on same page so i am using ur code in my views/posts/new.html.erb. sorry if it is stupid question. – September

Hi Murtza, all I've done is taken your code from above and removed the repetitive parts; I'm not familiar with globalize. – Cataplasia

<% [:en, :es, :fr].each do |lang| %> could be <% {en:'English',es:'Spanish',fr:'French'}.each do |sym,lang| %> that way the mapping is done in a hash and can be used with your h2 for and then <% f.globalize_fields_for sym do |g| %> – Nianiabi

Yep, that would work fine. (My hope was that a hash mapping locale to language already existed somewhere, e.g groups.google.com/forum/m/#!topic/rails-i18n/cFbxHcOVfnA) – Cataplasia

Answer 2

The batch translation gem is quite old and I've had difficulties using it with newer versions of Rails. I stumbled on another gem called globalize-accessors which supports Rails 4. What's great is that it gives you access to methods like title_en, teaser_es, title_fr and so on.

So for example if you had a Feature model with names that should be in all languages you could to the following:

# => Feature Model (feature.rb)
class Feature < ActiveRecord::Base
  translates :name
  globalize_accessors :attributes => [:name]
end

Using the Feature.globalize_attribute_names method would give an array of [:name_en, :name_es, :name_fr] that can be used in the form_for helper:

//New Feature (new.html.haml)
= form_for @feature do |f|
  - Feature.globalize_attribute_names.each do |lang|
    = f.text_field lang
  = f.submit

Springer

@Adam Cooper This is nice for a single attribute_name, but when you have more than one globalize_attribute_names.each do |lang| turns into a stream of all attributes and all languages. Say, 5 times 7, and it looks like soup. Are there any helpers to sort matters out? – Duckweed