Storing Information in Multiple Languages

For directories that contains a single language, it is not necessary to do anything special to add a new entry to the directory. However, for multinational organizations, it can be necessary to store information in multiple languages so that users in different locales can view directory information in their own language.

When information is represented in multiple languages, the server associates language tags with attribute values. When a new entry is added, attribute values used in the RDN (Relative Distinguished Name) must be added without any language codes.

Multiple languages can be stored within a single attribute. The attribute type is the same, but each attribute value has a different language code. The language tag has no effect on how the string is stored within the directory. All object class and attribute strings are stored using UTF-8.

For a list of the languages supported by Directory Server and their associated language tags, refer to Identifying Supported Locales.

For example, the example.com Corporation has offices in the United States and France. The company wants employees to be able to view directory information in their native language. When a directory entry is added for a new employee, Babs Jensen, the administrator creates the entry in LDIF. The administrator creates values for the personalTitle attribute in English and French, as follows:

dn: uid=bjensen,ou=people, o=example.com Corp
objectclass: top
objectclass: person
objectclass: organizationalPerson
name: Babs Jensen
cn: Babs Jensen
sn: Jensen
uid: bjensen
personalTitle: Miss
personalTitle;lang-en: Miss
personalTitle;lang-fr: Mlle
preferredLanguage: fr

Users accessing this directory entry with an LDAP client with the preferred language set to English will see the personal title Miss. Users accessing the directory with an LDAP client with the preferred language set to French will see the title Mlle.