typesbcp47

TypesBCP47

TypeScript library for language tags from BCP47

Installation

npm install typesbcp47

Class LanguageUtils provides static methods for parsing and validating language tags from BCP47.

Method	Description
getTagDescription(tag: string): string	Returns a language description for the tag if the tag is a valid language tag. Returns undefined otherwise.
normalizeCode(code: string): string	Returns a normalized code if the code is valid.
isCJK(code: string): boolean	Returns true if the language is Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese or Aiunu. Returns false otherwise.
isBiDi(code: string): boolean	Returns true if the language is written from right to left (Arabic, Hebrew, Persian, Urdu), false otherwise.
getLanguages(locale: string): Array<Language>	Returns an array of Language objects with descriptions in the selected locale.
getLanguage(code: string, locale: string): Language	Returns a Language object by its code with descriptions in the selected locale if the code is valid. Returns undefined otherwise.
getCommonLanguages(locale: string): Array<Language>	Returns an array of most common Language objects with descriptions in the selected locale.

Valid values for locale parameter are en, es and fr.

You can combine these methods to validate language tags:

import { LanguageUtils } from 'typesbcp47';

const tag = 'en-US';
const description = LanguageUtils.getTagDescription(tag);

if (description) {
  console.log(`Language tag ${tag} is valid. Description: ${description}`);
} else {
  console.log(`Language tag ${tag} is invalid.`);
}

// a common problem with language tags is wrong casing for the code
// this can be fixed by normalizing the code

const normalizedCode = LanguageUtils.normalizeCode(tag);

if (normalizedCode) {
    // language exists
    if (tag === normalizedCode) {
        // language tag is OK
        console.log(`Language tag ${tag} is valid.`);
    } else {
        // language tag is not normalized
        console.log(`Language code is incorrect, it should be ${normalizedCode}`)
    }
} else {
  console.log(`Code ${tag} is invalid.`);
}