Change Language in C#

Betamoo picture Betamoo · Jul 19, 2010 · Viewed 35.6k times · Source

I am developing a multilingual program in C# on Windows

How to change Windows writing language on certain actions...
e.g. to change from English to Arabic on focus event.

Thanks

Answer

Dr Herbie picture Dr Herbie · Jul 19, 2010

To select a whole new culture, set the CurrentThread.CurrentCulture to a new culture, e.g. to set to French:

System.Globalization.CultureInfo ci = new System.Globalization.CultureInfo("fr-FR");
System.Threading.Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentCulture = ci;

You can find a list of the predefined CultureInfo names here and here.

If you want to change certain aspects of the default culture, you can grab the current thread's culture, use it it's name to create a new CultureInfo instance and set the thread's new culture with some changes, e.g. to change the current culture to use the 'Euro' symbol:

System.Globalization.CultureInfo ci = new System.Globalization.CultureInfo( System.Threading.Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentCulture.Name);
ci.NumberFormat.CurrencySymbol = "€";
System.Threading.Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentCulture = ci;