You sometimes need to access the __() helper for text translation outside of a template. There are two ways to do it.

You can include the I18NHelper.php manually in your action, or use the symfony command to include a helper (sfLoaded::LoadHElpers()):

sfLoader::LoadHelpers(array('I18N'));

The problem is that this will add the helper functions to the global namespace. Alternately, use the following syntax:

sfContext::getInstance()->getI18n()->__($text, $args, 'messages');

Note: prior to 1.0, you had to do this (now deprecated)

sfConfig::get('sf_i18n_instance')->__($text, $args, 'messages');

(updated 29/11/06)

Returns localized image <img> tag bassed on the the user culture and the image file location in the filesystem.

Based on the technique recomended in the symfony advent calendar day twenty-three

Directory tructure:

Inside images directory, create one directory for each culture in use plus one (named 'no-loc' by default) for non-localized images or images that doesn't change for different cultures.

Example:

web/images/en_US
web/images/es_MX
web/images/fr_FR
................
web/images/non-loc

<?php
/**
 * Returns localized image <img> tag bassed on the the user culture
 * and the image file location in the filesystem
 * 
 * If the image file is found under the directory corresponding
 * the user culture, it returns its img tag,
 * else returns img tag under 'non-loc'directory.
 * 
 *  Structure example:
 * 
 *   web/images/en_US
 *   web/images/es_MX
 *   web/images/fr_FR
 *   ................
 *   web/images/non-loc
 * 
 * $source   -  relative path within culture directory
 * $options  -  is a normal options array passed to image_tag function
 * 
 */
function local_image_tag($source, $options = array())
{
  $images_path       = sfConfig::get('sf_root_dir') . '/web/images';
  $non_localized_dir = 'non-loc';
  $culture           = sfContext::getInstance()->getUser()->getCulture();
  $default_ext       = 'png';
 
  if (strpos(basename($source), '.') === false)
  {
    $source .= '.'.$default_ext;
  }
 
  if (!$culture || !(is_file($images_path.'/'.$culture.'/'.$source)))
  {
    return image_tag($non_localized_dir.'/'.$source, $options);
  }
 
  return image_tag($culture.'/'.$source, $options);
}
?>

Call example:

<?php
echo local_image_tag('some/image', 'alt=image');
/*
Will search in /web/images/<culture>/some/image.png,
and if file is not found, will return image tag in
/web/images/non-loc/some/image.png
*/
?>