Best practice for ASP.NET MVC resource files

Question

What are the best usage of the following resource files.

1. Properties → Resources (Phil used this resource for localization in DataAnnotation)
2. App_GlobalResources folder
3. App_LocalResources folder

I also would like to know what is the difference between (1) and (2) in asp.net mvc application.

Answer 1

You should avoid App_GlobalResources and App_LocalResources. Like Craig mentioned, there are problems with App_GlobalResources/App_LocalResources because you can't access them outside of the ASP.NET runtime. A good example of how this would be problematic is when you're unit testing your app.

K. Scott Allen blogged about this a while ago. He does a good job of explaining the problem with App_GlobalResources in ASP.NET MVC here.