xamarin-resources-generator

A collection of MsBuild Tasks for Xamarin resources generation.

Available in Nuget

https://www.nuget.org/packages/Xamarin.Resources.Generator/

Install-Package Xamarin.Resources.Generator -Version 1.0.0

Usage

• Install Nuget package in PCL project
• Open your PCL.csproj file with a text editor and update the following lines:

Declare the build tasks

<UsingTask TaskName="AndroidLanguagesGenerator" AssemblyFile="$(NuGetPackageRoot)xamarin.resources.generator/1.0.0/lib/netstandard2.1/XamarinResourcesGenerator.dll" />
<UsingTask TaskName="LocalizationEnumGenerator" AssemblyFile="$(NuGetPackageRoot)xamarin.resources.generator/1.0.0/lib/netstandard2.1/XamarinResourcesGenerator.dll" />

Create a PreBuild target and customize the tasks

<Target Name="PreBuild" BeforeTargets="PreBuildEvent">
    <AndroidLanguagesGenerator OriginFolder="../PCL/Localization" DestinationFolder="../Droid/Resources" />
    <LocalizationEnumGenerator OriginResxFolder="../PCL/Localization" PackageName="PCL.Localization" AssemblyName="PCL" />
</Target>

Available Build Tasks

LocalizationEnumGenerator

Generates a StringManager class that provides localized strings from multiple .resx files.

Required properties:

• OriginResxFolder folder used for fetch all .resx files with the strings
• PackageName package name used for the StringManager and LocalizedString class generation
• AssemblyName assembly name needed for .resx fetch

Usage:

• Place a .resx file in PCL/Localization folder with the following content

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<root>
    <resheader name="resmimetype">
        <value>text/microsoft-resx</value>
    </resheader>
    <resheader name="version">
        <value>2.0</value>
    </resheader>
    <resheader name="reader">
        <value>System.Resources.ResXResourceReader, System.Windows.Forms, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089</value>
    </resheader>
    <resheader name="writer">
        <value>System.Resources.ResXResourceWriter, System.Windows.Forms, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089</value>
    </resheader>
     
    <data name="helloWorld">
        <value>Hello World!</value>
    </data>
    .
    .
    .
    .
    .
</root>

• Define the task in the PCL .csproj

<LocalizationEnumGenerator OriginResxFolder="../PCL/Localization" PackageName="PCL.Localization" AssemblyName="PCL" />

• Build the project, now you can fetch the string with the StringManager:

var enumGenerated = PCL.Localization.LocalizedString.helloWorld;
var helloWorldMessage = PCL.Localization.StringManager.Instance.GetString(enumGenerated);

Multi languages support:

• create one .resx file for each language you need, for example resources.resx, resources.it.resx, resources.fr.resx ...
• StringManager class, when initialized, set the default Culture set by the user, if you would like to change at runtime you can call StringManager.SetCulture(CultureInfo cultureInfo)

AndroidLanguagesGenerator

task that transform all .resx files in a specified folder into the corresponding android string format files, for example:

• resources.resx -> values/strings.xml
• resources.fr.resx -> values-fr/strings.xml
• resources.it.resx -> values-it/strings.xml

Required properties:

• OriginFolder Path to the source folder from which the task retrieves all the .resx files to be transformed
• DestinationFolder Path to the target Android folder where the task generates the values folders

Usage:

• Place a .resx file in PCL/Localization folder
• Define the task in the PCL .csproj

<AndroidLanguagesGenerator OriginFolder="../PCL/Localization" DestinationFolder="../Droid/Resources" />

• Build the project, now you can see the string.xml files generated for each language in the res directory:

var helloWorldString = Activity.GetString(Resource.String.helloWorld);