How to change the default language and add it_IT.UTF-8 locale to locale.gen on Azure?

Question

I'm trying to change the default language on the Azure machine hosting my app. Currently, the default language is set to en_US.UTF-8 and is the only one in locale.gen, but I need to configure it to it_IT.UTF-8 to support my Django project. When I start my app and the Django app execute the "import locale" command followed by "locale.setlocale(locale.LC_TIME, 'it_IT.utf8')", I get the "unsupported locale setting" error. I suspect that the Italian language is not properly configured in the system. What are the necessary steps to change the default language and add the it_IT.UTF-8 locale to locale.gen on Azure? Or any others solution? Thank you in advance for your assistance!

I created a startup.sh file in the home directory (the only persistent location) with the following commands: echo "it_IT.UTF-8" >> locale.gen locale-gen

Then, in the Azure App configuration under General settings, I specified the path /home/startup.sh in Stack Settings > Startup Command. However, when I attempted to start the machine with this configuration, the startup failed for unknown reasons.

I expected the startup.sh script to modify the locale.gen file and generate the it_IT.UTF-8 locale successfully.

Answer 1

You can make use of the sample github repository here by very academy.

In your settings.py add this code to set the default language and import new languages like below:-

settings.py

"""
Django settings for core project.

Generated by 'django-admin startproject' using Django 3.1.6.

For more information on this file, see
https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/3.1/topics/settings/

For the full list of settings and their values, see
https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/3.1/ref/settings/
"""
import os
from pathlib import Path


# Build paths inside the project like this: BASE_DIR / 'subdir'.
BASE_DIR = Path(__file__).resolve().parent.parent


# Quick-start development settings - unsuitable for production
# See https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/3.1/howto/deployment/checklist/

# SECURITY WARNING: keep the secret key used in production secret!
SECRET_KEY = 'o4azh=5b&5_50o$fr1h8v!^1o96*)%rri9d-wjo5icb2_!ip6d'

# SECURITY WARNING: don't run with debug turned on in production!
DEBUG = True

ALLOWED_HOSTS = []


# Application definition

INSTALLED_APPS = [
    'django.contrib.admin',
    'django.contrib.auth',
    'django.contrib.contenttypes',
    'django.contrib.sessions',
    'django.contrib.messages',
    'django.contrib.staticfiles',
    'lang',
    'rosetta'
]

MIDDLEWARE = [
    'django.middleware.security.SecurityMiddleware',
    'django.contrib.sessions.middleware.SessionMiddleware',
    'django.middleware.locale.LocaleMiddleware',
    'django.middleware.common.CommonMiddleware',
    'django.middleware.csrf.CsrfViewMiddleware',
    'django.contrib.auth.middleware.AuthenticationMiddleware',
    'django.contrib.messages.middleware.MessageMiddleware',
    'django.middleware.clickjacking.XFrameOptionsMiddleware',
]

ROOT_URLCONF = 'core.urls'

TEMPLATES = [
    {
        'BACKEND': 'django.template.backends.django.DjangoTemplates',
        'DIRS': [],
        'APP_DIRS': True,
        'OPTIONS': {
            'context_processors': [
                'django.template.context_processors.debug',
                'django.template.context_processors.request',
                'django.contrib.auth.context_processors.auth',
                'django.contrib.messages.context_processors.messages',
            ],
        },
    },
]

WSGI_APPLICATION = 'core.wsgi.application'


# Database
# https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/3.1/ref/settings/#databases

DATABASES = {
    'default': {
        'ENGINE': 'django.db.backends.sqlite3',
        'NAME': BASE_DIR / 'db.sqlite3',
    }
}


# Password validation
# https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/3.1/ref/settings/#auth-password-validators

AUTH_PASSWORD_VALIDATORS = [
    {
        'NAME': 'django.contrib.auth.password_validation.UserAttributeSimilarityValidator',
    },
    {
        'NAME': 'django.contrib.auth.password_validation.MinimumLengthValidator',
    },
    {
        'NAME': 'django.contrib.auth.password_validation.CommonPasswordValidator',
    },
    {
        'NAME': 'django.contrib.auth.password_validation.NumericPasswordValidator',
    },
]


# Internationalization
# https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/3.1/topics/i18n/

LANGUAGE_CODE = 'en-us'

TIME_ZONE = 'UTC'

USE_I18N = True

USE_L10N = True

USE_TZ = True


# Static files (CSS, JavaScript, Images)
# https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/3.1/howto/static-files/

STATIC_URL = '/static/'

from django.utils.translation import gettext_lazy as _

LANGUAGE_CODE = 'en'

LANGUAGES = (
    ('en', _('English')),
    ('fr', _('French')),
    ('fr', _('French')),
    ('it', _('Italy'))

)

LOCALE_PATHS = (
    os.path.join(BASE_DIR, 'locale/'),
)

Here default language is set to English - en and rest all the languages are imported.

Now, Create 3 folders for different languages English, French and Italy in locale folder. And run the command below to populate the language translation setting in the same like below:-

Open your virtual environment with the commands below:-

py -m venv .venv
.venv\scripts\activate

And run the command below to populate the settings:-

py manage.py makemessages --all

Now, Visit locale> it > django.po file and write the text you need to translate instead of hello, I have written ciao like below:-

#: .\lang\views.py:10 .\lang\views.py:17
msgid "hello"
msgstr "ciao"

Now, Run the app from virtual environment locally using the command below:-

py manage.py runserver

The Web app will load like below, Change the language to French and Italian and get your desired language translated within the web app.

No, I deployed this application to Azure Web app with Python runtime and it git deployed successfully like below:-

Before deployment in **settings.py ** add allowed host to your azure web app host name like below:-

ALLOWED_HOSTS  = ['siliconwebapp87.azurewebsites.net']

In your scenario you can change the default language by adding it_IT.UTF-8 in your local.gen.

If local.gen does not exist create it.

sudo nano /etc/locale.gen
#add the line below in locale.gen or uncomment it if it already exist
it_IT.UTF-8 UTF-8
sudo update-locale LANG=it_IT.UTF-8
#create a startup.sh file and add the below code:-
nano startup.sh
echo "it_IT.UTF-8 UTF-8" >> /etc/locale.gen
locale-gen
chmod +x startup.sh
#run the script manually and check once:-
./startup.sh
#Once it runs successfully locally, Add the below script in your startup command in Azure app service configuration > General Settings:-
bash /home/startup.sh

Now, In your settings.py file add the following code:-

import locale
try:
    locale.setlocale(locale.LC_TIME, 'it_IT.utf8')
except locale.Error:
    pass