NAME
Unicode::ICU::MessageFormat - ICU’s MessageFormat class
SYNOPSIS
use utf8;
my $formatter = Unicode::ICU::MessageFormat->new('en');
my $chars = $formatter->format('The time is {0, time} on {0, date}.', [time]);
# Named arguments are also acceptable:
my $chars = $formatter->format('The time is {now, time} on {now, date}.', { now => time() });DESCRIPTION
This module facilitates formatting of ICU message pattern strings.
For a description of the message pattern format, see ICU’s documentation.
COMPATIBILITY
Named arguments require ICU 4.8 or later.
CONSTANTS
CAN_TAKE_NAMED_ARGUMENTS
A boolean that indicates whether format() can accept named arguments as well as positional.
METHODS
$obj = CLASS->new( [$LOCALE] )
Returns an instance of this class. If $LOCALE is not given then we’ll use ICU’s default.
$str = OBJ->format( $PATTERN [, \@ARGUMENTS | \%ARGUMENTS ] );
Formats the given $PATTERN with the given @ARGUMENTS and returns the resulting string.
Note the following important caveats:
Dates & Times
Unlike in ICU, dates & times are expressed in seconds rather than milliseconds.
Arguments
Arguments may be positional or (assuming a recent enough ICU) named.
Positional Arguments
If you give arguments as an array reference, then $PATTERN’s arguments MUST be a continuous sequence starting at 0. A “missing” argument will trigger an exception.
Note that ICU positional arguments are zero-indexed. This differs from Locale::Maketext and other systems that use 1-indexing. So if you do this:
# bad:
$formatter->format('My name is {1}.', ['Jonas'])… you’ll get an exception. ({0} is what you want, not {1}.) If you really want, though, you could use named arguments; see below.
Named Arguments
NOTE: This library cannot handle named arguments for all ICU versions.
The above is probably easier to read and maintain as:
$formatter->format('My name is {name}.', { name => 'Jonas' })You can also give named arguments for a positional-argument $PATTERN; in fact, if you do that, you can have “missing” arguments, e.g.:
# ok:
$formatter->format('My name is {1}.', { 1 => 'Jonas' })$locale = OBJ->get_locale()
Returns OBJ’s configured locale.