Understanding the Session Language

In the PeopleSoft Pure Internet Architecture, the session language is the language selected by the user on the sign-in page before entering a user name and password. The session language controls the language in which the user views language-sensitive data and objects in the application for the duration of that session.

If the session language is the database’s base language, then all language-sensitive data, messages, and objects appear in the base language. If the session language is a non-base language, then any language-sensitive data, messages, and objects that have been translated appear in the preferred language; those that have not been translated appear in the base language. For example, if a user’s language for a particular session is Spanish, PeopleTools attempts to display menus and field labels in Spanish for each page viewed in that session, and if the table from which the data is being fetched has a related language record associated with it, PeopleTools also attempts to fetch the Spanish translations of the data from this table.