Android & menu localization

Question

I would like to change language (locale of application) programmatically.

The main problem for me is updating menu labels.

I tried the following method:

 @Override
public boolean onMenuOpened(int featureId, Menu menu) {
    if (shouldChangeMenuLabels) {
        for (int i = 0; i < menu.size(); i++) {
            MenuItem menuItem = menu.getItem(i);
            switch (menuItem.getItemId()) {
                case R.id.menu_main_about:
                    menuItem.setTitle(R.string.menu_about);
                    break;
                case R.id.menu_main_preferences:
                    menuItem.setTitle(R.string.menu_prefs);
                    break;
            }
        }
        shouldChangeMenuLabels = false;
    }

But I'm sure it bad idea. I want to avoid using switch-case statement as this is not universal method (I can't simply port the snipped to other activities / I can't make abstract class which would do that).

---

BTW, all menus have been described into menu/*.xml files so I don't want duplicating the code. Anybody has ideas?

Concerned to first answer: I hae changed locale with the following code:

            Locale locale = new Locale((String)newValue);
            Locale.setDefault(locale);
            Configuration config = new Configuration();
            config.locale = locale;
            getApplication().getResources().updateConfiguration(config, getApplication().getResources().getDisplayMetrics());

But as I want to control rotating for each activity, they are never finished. Maybe I did something wrong?

Answer 1

I don't know is it a good idea, but I've found following way:

 @Override
public boolean onMenuOpened(int featureId, Menu menu) {
    if (shouldChangeLocale) {
        menu.clear();
        MenuInflater inflater = getMenuInflater(); // -->onCreateMenu (Menu) 
        inflater.inflate(R.menu.menu_main, menu);  // /
        shouldChangeLocale=false;
    }

    return super.onMenuOpened(featureId, menu);
}

I need your advice, should I do this such way?

Answer 2

Have you read through the documentation on Android Localization? Typically you create a different strings file for each language/locale that you want to support. In your menu.xml file you can reference the string id's, and the proper value will be selected based on the current locale settings.