Globalization in JavaScript DatePicker control

23 Mar 2023 / 5 minutes to read

Globalization is the combination of adapting the component to various languages by means of parsing and formatting the date or number Internationalization and also by adding cultural specific customizations and translating the text localization

By default, DatePicker date format, week and month names are specific to English culture. It utilizes the Essential JavaScript 2 Internationalization package to parse and format the date object based on the culture by using the official UNICODE CLDR JSON data and it allows to load the culture specific CLDR JSON data by using loadCldr method

The DatePicker component supports only the Gregorian type of calendar. All the Essential JS 2 component are specific to English culture (‘en-US’). If you want to go with the different culture other than English, follow the below steps.

Install the CLDR-Data package by using the below command (it installs the CLDR JSON data). To know more about CLDR-Data refer the CLDR-Data link.

npm install cldr-data --save

Once the package installed, you can find the culture specific JSON data under the location /node_modules/cldr-data.

Now import the installed CLDR JSON data into the app.ts file. To import JSON data we need to install the JSON plugin loader. Here we have used the SystemJS JSON plugin loader.

npm install systemjs-plugin-json --save-dev

Once installed, configure the system.config.js configuration settings as like below to map the systemjs-plugin-json loader.

System.config({
paths: {
    'npm:': './node_modules/',
    'syncfusion:': 'npm:@syncfusion/'

},
map: {
    app: 'app',

    //Syncfusion packages mapping
    "@syncfusion/ej2-base": "syncfusion:ej2-base/dist/ej2-base.umd.min.js",
    "@syncfusion/ej2-data": "syncfusion:ej2-data/dist/ej2-data.umd.min.js",
    "@syncfusion/ej2-inputs": "syncfusion:ej2-inputs/dist/ej2-inputs.umd.min.js",
    "@syncfusion/ej2-popups": "syncfusion:ej2-popups/dist/ej2-popups.umd.min.js",
    "@syncfusion/ej2-buttons": "syncfusion:ej2-buttons/dist/ej2-buttons.umd.min.js",
    "@syncfusion/ej2-splitbuttons": "syncfusion:ej2-splitbuttons/dist/ej2-splitbuttons.umd.min.js",
    "@syncfusion/ej2-lists": "syncfusion:ej2-lists/dist/ej2-lists.umd.min.js",
    "@syncfusion/ej2-calendars": "syncfusion:ej2-calendars/dist/ej2-calendars.umd.min.js",
    "cldr-data": 'npm:cldr-data',
    "plugin-json": "npm:systemjs-plugin-json/json.js"
},
meta: {
    '*.json': { loader: 'plugin-json' }
},
packages: {
    'app': { main: 'app', defaultExtension: 'js' },
    'cldr-data': { main: 'index.js', defaultExtension: 'js' }
}
});

System.import('app');

Now use the loadCldr method to load the culture specific CLDR JSON data from the installed location to app.ts file.
DatePicker displayed Sunday as the first day of week based on default culture (“en-US”). If you want to display the DatePicker with loaded culture’s first day of week, you need to import weekdata.json file from the cldr-data/suppemental as given in the code example.

//Load the loadCldr from ej2-base
import { loadCldr } from '@syncfusion/ej2-base';

declare var require: any;

loadCldr(
require('cldr-data/main/de/ca-gregorian.json'),
require('cldr-data/main/de/numbers.json'),
require('cldr-data/main/de/timeZoneNames.json'),
require('cldr-data/supplemental/weekdata.json') // To load the culture based first day of week
);

The Localization library allows you to localize default text content of the DatePicker. The DatePicker component has static text for today feature that can be changed to other cultures (Arabic, Deutsch, French, etc.) by defining the locale value and translation object.

Locale keywords	Text
today	Name of the button to choose Today date.
placeholder	Hint to describe expected value in input element.

Before changing the culture other than English, ensure that locale text for the concerned culture is loaded through load method of L10n class.

//Load the L10n from ej2-base
import { L10n } from '@syncfusion/ej2-base';

//load the locale object to set the localized placeholder value
L10n.load({
'de': {
    'datepicker': { placeholder: 'Wählen Sie ein Datum aus',
     today:'heute'  }
}
});

Set the culture by using the locale property. The below code example, initialize the DatePicker component in German culture with corresponding localized text.

//Load the L10n from ej2-base
import { L10n } from '@syncfusion/ej2-base';
import { DatePicker } from '@syncfusion/ej2-calendars';

//load the locale object to set the localized placeholder value
L10n.load({
'de': {
    'datepicker': { placeholder: 'Wählen Sie ein Datum aus',
     today:'heute' }
}
});

let datepickerObject: DatePicker = new DatePicker({
//sets the locale.
locale: 'de'
});

datepickerObject.appendTo('#element');

The following example demonstrates the DatePicker in German culture.

Source

Preview

app.ts

index.html

import { DatePicker } from '@syncfusion/ej2-calendars';
//Load the L10n, loadCldr from ej2-base
import { loadCldr, L10n } from '@syncfusion/ej2-base';
//load the CLDR data files.
import * as numberingSystems from './numberingSystems.json';
import * as gregorian from './ca-gregorian.json';
import * as numbers from './numbers.json';
import * as timeZoneNames from './timeZoneNames.json';

loadCldr(numberingSystems, gregorian, numbers, timeZoneNames);
L10n.load({
'de': {
    'datepicker': {
        placeholder: 'Wählen Sie ein Datum aus',
        today:'heute'
    }
}
});

// creates the simple DatePicker component
let datepickerObject: DatePicker = new DatePicker({
// sets the locale property.
locale: 'de',
value: new Date()
});
datepickerObject.appendTo('#element');

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">

<head>
            
    <title>Essential JS 2 DatePicker control</title>
    <meta charset="utf-8" />
    <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0" />
    <meta name="description" content="Typescript UI Controls" />
    <meta name="author" content="Syncfusion" />
    <link href="styles.css" rel="stylesheet" />
    <!--style reference from the DatePicker component-->
    <link href="//cdn.syncfusion.com/ej2/21.1.35/ej2-base/styles/material.css" rel="stylesheet" />
    <link href="//cdn.syncfusion.com/ej2/21.1.35/ej2-buttons/styles/material.css" rel="stylesheet" />
    <link href="//cdn.syncfusion.com/ej2/21.1.35/ej2-inputs/styles/material.css" rel="stylesheet" />
    <link href="//cdn.syncfusion.com/ej2/21.1.35/ej2-popups/styles/material.css" rel="stylesheet" />
    <link href="//cdn.syncfusion.com/ej2/21.1.35/ej2-calendars/styles/material.css" rel="stylesheet" />
    <script src="https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/systemjs/0.19.38/system.js"></script>
    <script src="systemjs.config.js"></script>
</head>

<body>
    <div id='loader'>LOADING....</div>
    <div id='container'>
        <input id='element' />
    </div>
</body>

</html>

Right-To-Left

The DatePicker supports right-to-left functionality for languages like Arabic, Hebrew to displays the text in the right-to-left direction. Use enableRtl property to set the RTL direction.

import { DatePicker } from '@syncfusion/ej2-calendars';
//Load the L10n from ej2-base
import { L10n, loadCldr } from '@syncfusion/ej2-base';

declare var require: any;

loadCldr(
require('cldr-data/supplemental/numberingSystems.json'),
require('cldr-data/main/he/ca-gregorian.json'),
require('cldr-data/main/he/numbers.json')
require('cldr-data/main/he/timeZoneNames.json')
);

//load the locale object to set the localized placeholder value
L10n.load({
'he': {
        'datepicker': { placeholder: 'הזן תאריך',
        today:'היום' }
      }
});

// creates the datepicker with Hebrew culture.
let datepickerobject: DatePicker = new DatePicker({
//sets the locale
locale: 'he',
value: new Date(),
//sets the enableRtl
enableRtl: true
});
datepickerobject.appendTo('#element');

The below code example demonstrates the DatePicker component in Hebrew culture and also explains how to set the localized text to the placeholder using load method of L10n class.

Source

Preview

app.ts

index.html

import { loadCldr, L10n } from '@syncfusion/ej2-base';
import { DatePicker } from '@syncfusion/ej2-calendars';
import * as numberingSystems from './numberingSystems.json';
import * as gregorian from './ca-gregorian.json';
import * as numbers from './numbers.json';
import * as timeZoneNames from './timeZoneNames.json';

loadCldr(numberingSystems, gregorian, numbers, timeZoneNames);

L10n.load({
'he': {
    'datepicker': {
        placeholder: 'הזן תאריך',
        today:'היום'
    }
}
});

// creates the simple DatePicker component
let datepickerObject: DatePicker = new DatePicker({
//sets the locale
locale: 'he',
//sets the enableRtl
enableRtl: true,
//sets the value
value: new Date()
});
datepickerObject.appendTo('#element');

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">

<head>
            
    <title>Essential JS 2 DatePicker control</title>
    <meta charset="utf-8" />
    <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0" />
    <meta name="description" content="Typescript UI Controls" />
    <meta name="author" content="Syncfusion" />
    <link href="styles.css" rel="stylesheet" />
    <!--style reference from the DatePicker component-->
    <link href="//cdn.syncfusion.com/ej2/21.1.35/ej2-base/styles/material.css" rel="stylesheet" />
    <link href="//cdn.syncfusion.com/ej2/21.1.35/ej2-buttons/styles/material.css" rel="stylesheet" />
    <link href="//cdn.syncfusion.com/ej2/21.1.35/ej2-inputs/styles/material.css" rel="stylesheet" />
    <link href="//cdn.syncfusion.com/ej2/21.1.35/ej2-popups/styles/material.css" rel="stylesheet" />
    <link href="//cdn.syncfusion.com/ej2/21.1.35/ej2-calendars/styles/material.css" rel="stylesheet" />
    <script src="https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/systemjs/0.19.38/system.js"></script>
    <script src="systemjs.config.js"></script>
</head>

<body>
    <div id='loader'>LOADING....</div>
    <div id='container'>
        <input id='element' />
    </div>
</body>

</html>

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