The __ helper function can be used to retrieve lines of text from language files. You can retrieve lines of text from either key-based translation files (represented as PHP arrays) or from literal, string-based translation files (represented as a JSON object).
Replacements are passed as a key/value pair. The replacement keys will be matched to any placeholders within the translation string. Placeholders begin with a single colon (:) followed by a name and a space. For example, in the validation.php language file, the following lines can be found:
<?php
return [
// ...
'accepted' => 'The :attribute must be accepted.',
'active_url' => 'The :attribute is not a valid URL.',
// ...
];
In the above translation lines, :attribute is a placeholder that can be replaced using the $parameters parameter. The following code examples will demonstrate the results of the $parameters parameter.
Signature
The signature of the __ method is:
function __(
$key,
$replace = [],
$locale = null
);
The default value of $locale is null, which will indicate to the translation service the applications default locale should be used.
Example Use
If we look in the resources/lang/en/validation.php resource file, we will see something similar to the following defined at the top of the file:
<?php
return [
// ...
'accepted' => 'The :attribute must be accepted.',
// ...
];
We can retrieve the accepted line like so:
$translatedText = __('validation.accepted');
If the above code was executed, the $translatedText variable would contain the following value:
The :attribute must be accepted.
However, the returned text contains the :attribute placeholder, we can supply arguments to the __ function using the $replace array parameter:
$translatedText = __('validation.accepted', [
'attribute' => 'Terms of Service'
]);
Now, with the newly supplied $replace argument, the $translatedText variable would now contain the following value:
The Terms of Service must be accepted.
Supplying a Locale
For the next example, we will create a new file at resources/lang/es.json to both showcase literal based language files as well as how the $locale parameter can be used.
Note: with JSON based language files, there is only one file per locale (meaning, when using JSON language files we would not have a different file for validation messages, error messages, etc).
The contents of this new validation.json file should be:
{
"validation.accepted": "Los :attribute deben ser aceptados."
}
When using JSON based language files, we cannot nest the translation keys; for this example we are providing compatibility with dot notation by specifying our key in dot notation.
We can resolve the Spanish translation for the accepted validation message like so:
$translatedText = __('validation.accepted', [
'attribute' => 'términos de servicio'
], 'es');
After the above example has executed, the $translatedText variable would contain the following value:
Los términos de servicio deben ser aceptados.
Example Within Blade Templates
The following examples demonstrate how we can retrieve language translations from within Blade templates:
{{-- Using the __ helper function --}}
<p>
{{ __('validation.accepted',
['attribute' => 'Terms of Service'])
}}
</p>
{{-- Using the @lang directive --}}
@lang('validation.accepted', ['attribute' => 'Terms of Service'])
{{ name }}