msgcat

msgcat

msgcat is a lightweight i18n message catalog for Go focused on APIs and error handling.

It loads messages from YAML by language, resolves language from context.Context, supports runtime message loading for system codes, and can wrap domain errors with localized short/long messages.

Maturity: production-ready (v1.x) with SemVer and release/migration docs in docs/.

Installation

go get github.com/loopcontext/msgcat

Quick Start

1. Create message files

Default path:

./resources/messages

Example en.yaml:

group: 0
default:
  short: Unexpected error
  long: Unexpected message code [{{0}}] was received and was not found in this catalog
set:
  1:
    short: User created
    long: User {{0}} was created successfully
  2:
    short: You have {{0}} {{plural:0|item|items}}
    long: Total: {{num:1}} generated at {{date:2}}

Example es.yaml:

group: 0
default:
  short: Error inesperado
  long: Se recibió un código de mensaje inesperado [{{0}}] y no se encontró en el catálogo
set:
  1:
    short: Usuario creado
    long: Usuario {{0}} fue creado correctamente
  2:
    short: Tienes {{0}} {{plural:0|elemento|elementos}}
    long: Total: {{num:1}} generado el {{date:2}}

2. Initialize catalog

catalog, err := msgcat.NewMessageCatalog(msgcat.Config{
  ResourcePath:      "./resources/messages",
  CtxLanguageKey:    "language",
  DefaultLanguage:   "en",
  FallbackLanguages: []string{"es"},
  StrictTemplates:   true,
  ObserverBuffer:    1024,
  StatsMaxKeys:      512,
  ReloadRetries:     2,
  ReloadRetryDelay:  50 * time.Millisecond,
})
if err != nil {
  panic(err)
}

3. Resolve messages/errors from context

ctx := context.WithValue(context.Background(), "language", "es-AR")

msg := catalog.GetMessageWithCtx(ctx, 1, "juan")
fmt.Println(msg.ShortText) // "Usuario creado"

err := catalog.WrapErrorWithCtx(ctx, errors.New("db timeout"), 2, 3, 12345.5, time.Now())
fmt.Println(err.Error()) // localized short message

Features

• Language resolution from context (typed key and string key compatibility).
• Language fallback chain: requested -> base (es-ar -> es) -> configured fallbacks -> default -> en.
• YAML + runtime-loaded system messages (9000-9999).
• Template tokens:
  • {{0}}, {{1}}, ... positional
  • {{plural:i|singular|plural}}
  • {{num:i}} localized number format
  • {{date:i}} localized date format
• Strict template mode (StrictTemplates) for missing parameters.
• Error wrapping with localized short/long messages and error code.
• Concurrency-safe reads/writes.
• Runtime reload (msgcat.Reload) preserving runtime-loaded messages.
• Observability hooks and counters (SnapshotStats).

API

Core interface

• LoadMessages(lang string, messages []RawMessage) error
• GetMessageWithCtx(ctx context.Context, msgCode int, msgParams ...interface{}) *Message
• WrapErrorWithCtx(ctx context.Context, err error, msgCode int, msgParams ...interface{}) error
• GetErrorWithCtx(ctx context.Context, msgCode int, msgParams ...interface{}) error

Helpers

• msgcat.Reload(catalog MessageCatalog) error
• msgcat.SnapshotStats(catalog MessageCatalog) (MessageCatalogStats, error)
• msgcat.ResetStats(catalog MessageCatalog) error
• msgcat.Close(catalog MessageCatalog) error

Constants

• SystemMessageMinCode = 9000
• SystemMessageMaxCode = 9999
• CodeMissingMessage = 999999998
• CodeMissingLanguage = 99999999

Observability

Provide an observer in config:

type Observer struct{}

func (Observer) OnLanguageFallback(requested, resolved string) {}
func (Observer) OnLanguageMissing(lang string) {}
func (Observer) OnMessageMissing(lang string, msgCode int) {}
func (Observer) OnTemplateIssue(lang string, msgCode int, issue string) {}

Snapshot counters at runtime:

stats, err := msgcat.SnapshotStats(catalog)
if err == nil {
  _ = stats.LanguageFallbacks
  _ = stats.MissingLanguages
  _ = stats.MissingMessages
  _ = stats.TemplateIssues
  _ = stats.DroppedEvents
  _ = stats.LastReloadAt
}

Production Notes

• Keep DefaultLanguage explicit (en recommended).
• Define FallbackLanguages intentionally (for example for regional traffic).
• Use StrictTemplates: true in production to detect bad template usage early.
• Set ObserverBuffer to avoid request-path pressure from slow observers.
• Set StatsMaxKeys to cap cardinality (__overflow__ key holds overflow counts).
• Use go test -race ./... in CI.
• For periodic YAML refresh, call msgcat.Reload(catalog) in a controlled goroutine and prefer atomic file replacement (write temp + rename).
• Use ReloadRetries and ReloadRetryDelay to reduce transient parse/read errors during rollout windows.
• If observer is configured, call msgcat.Close(catalog) on service shutdown.

Runtime Contract

• GetMessageWithCtx / GetErrorWithCtx / WrapErrorWithCtx are safe for concurrent use.
• LoadMessages and Reload are safe concurrently with reads.
• Reload keeps the last in-memory state if reload fails.
• Observer callbacks are async and panic-protected; overflow is counted in DroppedEvents.

Benchmarks

Run:

go test -run ^$ -bench . -benchmem ./...

Integration Examples

• HTTP language middleware sample: examples/http/main.go
• Metrics/observer sample (expvar style): examples/metrics/main.go

Context7 / LLM Docs

For full machine-friendly docs, see docs/CONTEXT7.md. For retrieval-optimized chunks, see docs/CONTEXT7_RETRIEVAL.md.

Release + Migration

• Changelog: docs/CHANGELOG.md
• Migration guide: docs/MIGRATION.md
• Release playbook: docs/RELEASE.md
• Support policy: docs/SUPPORT.md