Detect the language (Advanced edition)

Detect the language of a text string.

Explore further

For detailed documentation that includes this code sample, see the following:

• Detecting languages (Advanced)

Code sample

Go

Before trying this sample, follow the Go setup instructions in the Cloud Translation quickstart using client libraries. For more information, see the Cloud Translation Go API reference documentation.

To authenticate to Cloud Translation, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, see Set up authentication for a local development environment.

import (
	"context"
	"fmt"
	"io"

	translate "cloud.google.com/go/translate/apiv3"
	"cloud.google.com/go/translate/apiv3/translatepb"
)

// detectLanguage detects the language of a text string.
func detectLanguage(w io.Writer, projectID string, text string) error {
	// projectID := "my-project-id"
	// text := "Hello, world!"

	ctx := context.Background()
	client, err := translate.NewTranslationClient(ctx)
	if err != nil {
		return fmt.Errorf("NewTranslationClient: %w", err)
	}
	defer client.Close()

	req := &translatepb.DetectLanguageRequest{
		Parent:   fmt.Sprintf("projects/%s/locations/global", projectID),
		MimeType: "text/plain", // Mime types: "text/plain", "text/html"
		Source: &translatepb.DetectLanguageRequest_Content{
			Content: text,
		},
	}

	resp, err := client.DetectLanguage(ctx, req)
	if err != nil {
		return fmt.Errorf("DetectLanguage: %w", err)
	}

	// Display list of detected languages sorted by detection confidence.
	// The most probable language is first.
	for _, language := range resp.GetLanguages() {
		// The language detected.
		fmt.Fprintf(w, "Language code: %v\n", language.GetLanguageCode())
		// Confidence of detection result for this language.
		fmt.Fprintf(w, "Confidence: %v\n", language.GetConfidence())
	}

	return nil
}

Java

Before trying this sample, follow the Java setup instructions in the Cloud Translation quickstart using client libraries. For more information, see the Cloud Translation Java API reference documentation.

To authenticate to Cloud Translation, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, see Set up authentication for a local development environment.

import com.google.cloud.translate.v3.DetectLanguageRequest;
import com.google.cloud.translate.v3.DetectLanguageResponse;
import com.google.cloud.translate.v3.DetectedLanguage;
import com.google.cloud.translate.v3.LocationName;
import com.google.cloud.translate.v3.TranslationServiceClient;
import java.io.IOException;

public class DetectLanguage {

  public static void detectLanguage() throws IOException {
    // TODO(developer): Replace these variables before running the sample.
    String projectId = "YOUR-PROJECT-ID";
    String text = "your-text";

    detectLanguage(projectId, text);
  }

  // Detecting the language of a text string
  public static void detectLanguage(String projectId, String text) throws IOException {

    // Initialize client that will be used to send requests. This client only needs to be created
    // once, and can be reused for multiple requests. After completing all of your requests, call
    // the "close" method on the client to safely clean up any remaining background resources.
    try (TranslationServiceClient client = TranslationServiceClient.create()) {
      // Supported Locations: `global`, [glossary location], or [model location]
      // Glossaries must be hosted in `us-central1`
      // Custom Models must use the same location as your model. (us-central1)
      LocationName parent = LocationName.of(projectId, "global");

      // Supported Mime Types: https://cloud.google.com/translate/docs/supported-formats
      DetectLanguageRequest request =
          DetectLanguageRequest.newBuilder()
              .setParent(parent.toString())
              .setMimeType("text/plain")
              .setContent(text)
              .build();

      DetectLanguageResponse response = client.detectLanguage(request);

      // Display list of detected languages sorted by detection confidence.
      // The most probable language is first.
      for (DetectedLanguage language : response.getLanguagesList()) {
        // The language detected
        System.out.printf("Language code: %s\n", language.getLanguageCode());
        // Confidence of detection result for this language
        System.out.printf("Confidence: %s\n", language.getConfidence());
      }
    }
  }
}

Node.js

Before trying this sample, follow the Node.js setup instructions in the Cloud Translation quickstart using client libraries. For more information, see the Cloud Translation Node.js API reference documentation.

To authenticate to Cloud Translation, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, see Set up authentication for a local development environment.

/**
 * TODO(developer): Uncomment these variables before running the sample.
 */
// const projectId = 'YOUR_PROJECT_ID';
// const location = 'global';
// const text = 'text to translate';

// Imports the Google Cloud Translation library
const {TranslationServiceClient} = require('@google-cloud/translate');

// Instantiates a client
const translationClient = new TranslationServiceClient();

async function detectLanguage() {
  // Construct request
  const request = {
    parent: `projects/${projectId}/locations/${location}`,
    content: text,
  };

  // Run request
  const [response] = await translationClient.detectLanguage(request);

  console.log('Detected Languages:');
  for (const language of response.languages) {
    console.log(`Language Code: ${language.languageCode}`);
    console.log(`Confidence: ${language.confidence}`);
  }
}

detectLanguage();

PHP

Before trying this sample, follow the PHP setup instructions in the Cloud Translation quickstart using client libraries. For more information, see the Cloud Translation PHP API reference documentation.

To authenticate to Cloud Translation, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, see Set up authentication for a local development environment.

use Google\Cloud\Translate\V3\Client\TranslationServiceClient;
use Google\Cloud\Translate\V3\DetectLanguageRequest;

/**
 * @param string $text      The text whose language to detect.  This will be detected as en.
 * @param string $projectId Your Google Cloud project ID.
 */
function v3_detect_language(string $text, string $projectId): void
{
    $translationServiceClient = new TranslationServiceClient();

    /** Uncomment and populate these variables in your code */
    // $text = 'Hello, world!';
    // $projectId = '[Google Cloud Project ID]';
    $formattedParent = $translationServiceClient->locationName($projectId, 'global');

    // Optional. Can be "text/plain" or "text/html".
    $mimeType = 'text/plain';

    try {
        $request = (new DetectLanguageRequest())
            ->setParent($formattedParent)
            ->setContent($text)
            ->setMimeType($mimeType);
        $response = $translationServiceClient->detectLanguage($request);
        // Display list of detected languages sorted by detection confidence.
        // The most probable language is first.
        foreach ($response->getLanguages() as $language) {
            // The language detected
            printf('Language code: %s' . PHP_EOL, $language->getLanguageCode());
            // Confidence of detection result for this language
            printf('Confidence: %s' . PHP_EOL, $language->getConfidence());
        }
    } finally {
        $translationServiceClient->close();
    }
}

Python

Before trying this sample, follow the Python setup instructions in the Cloud Translation quickstart using client libraries. For more information, see the Cloud Translation Python API reference documentation.

To authenticate to Cloud Translation, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, see Set up authentication for a local development environment.

from google.cloud import translate


def detect_language(
    project_id: str = "YOUR_PROJECT_ID",
) -> translate.DetectLanguageResponse:
    """Detecting the language of a text string.

    Args:
        project_id: The GCP project ID.

    Returns:
        The detected language of the text.
    """
    client = translate.TranslationServiceClient()

    location = "global"

    parent = f"projects/{project_id}/locations/{location}"

    # Detail on supported types can be found here:
    # https://cloud.google.com/translate/docs/supported-formats
    response = client.detect_language(
        content="Hello, world!",
        parent=parent,
        mime_type="text/plain",  # mime types: text/plain, text/html
    )

    # Display list of detected languages sorted by detection confidence.
    # The most probable language is first.
    for language in response.languages:
        # The language detected
        print(f"Language code: {language.language_code}")
        # Confidence of detection result for this language
        print(f"Confidence: {language.confidence}")

    return response

What's next

To search and filter code samples for other Google Cloud products, see the Google Cloud sample browser.