CultureTypes Enum

Definition

Defines the types of culture lists that can be retrieved using the GetCultures(CultureTypes) method.

This enumeration supports a bitwise combination of its member values.

public enum class CultureTypes
[System.Flags]
public enum CultureTypes
[System.Flags]
[System.Serializable]
public enum CultureTypes
[System.Flags]
[System.Serializable]
[System.Runtime.InteropServices.ComVisible(true)]
public enum CultureTypes
[<System.Flags>]
type CultureTypes = 
[<System.Flags>]
[<System.Serializable>]
type CultureTypes = 
[<System.Flags>]
[<System.Serializable>]
[<System.Runtime.InteropServices.ComVisible(true)>]
type CultureTypes = 
Public Enum CultureTypes
Inheritance
CultureTypes
Attributes

Fields

AllCultures 7

All cultures that are recognized by .NET, including neutral and specific cultures and custom cultures created by the user.

On .NET Framework 4 and later versions and .NET Core running on Windows, it includes the culture data available from the Windows operating system. On .NET Core running on Linux and macOS, it includes culture data defined in the ICU libraries.

AllCultures is a composite field that includes the NeutralCultures, SpecificCultures, and InstalledWin32Cultures values.

FrameworkCultures 64

This member is deprecated; using this value with GetCultures(CultureTypes) returns neutral and specific cultures shipped with the .NET Framework 2.0.

InstalledWin32Cultures 4

This member is deprecated. All cultures that are installed in the Windows operating system.

NeutralCultures 1

Cultures that are associated with a language but are not specific to a country/region.

ReplacementCultures 16

This member is deprecated. Custom cultures created by the user that replace cultures shipped with the .NET Framework.

SpecificCultures 2

Cultures that are specific to a country/region.

UserCustomCulture 8

This member is deprecated. Custom cultures created by the user.

WindowsOnlyCultures 32

This member is deprecated and is ignored.

Examples

The following example demonstrates the CultureTypes.AllCultures enumeration member and the CultureTypes property.

using System;
using System.Globalization;

class Sample
{
    public static void Main()
    {
        // Get and enumerate all cultures.
        var allCultures = CultureInfo.GetCultures(CultureTypes.AllCultures);
        foreach (var ci in allCultures)
        {
            // Display the name of each culture.
            Console.Write($"{ci.EnglishName} ({ci.Name}): ");
            // Indicate the culture type.
            if (ci.CultureTypes.HasFlag(CultureTypes.NeutralCultures))
               Console.Write(" NeutralCulture");
            if (ci.CultureTypes.HasFlag(CultureTypes.SpecificCultures))
               Console.Write(" SpecificCulture");
            Console.WriteLine();
        }
    }
}
/*
The following is a portion of the output from this example.
      Tajik (tg):  NeutralCulture
      Tajik (Cyrillic) (tg-Cyrl):  NeutralCulture
      Tajik (Cyrillic, Tajikistan) (tg-Cyrl-TJ):  SpecificCulture
      Thai (th):  NeutralCulture
      Thai (Thailand) (th-TH):  SpecificCulture
      Tigrinya (ti):  NeutralCulture
      Tigrinya (Eritrea) (ti-ER):  SpecificCulture
      Tigrinya (Ethiopia) (ti-ET):  SpecificCulture
      Tigre (tig):  NeutralCulture
      Tigre (Eritrea) (tig-ER):  SpecificCulture
      Turkmen (tk):  NeutralCulture
      Turkmen (Turkmenistan) (tk-TM):  SpecificCulture
      Setswana (tn):  NeutralCulture
      Setswana (Botswana) (tn-BW):  SpecificCulture
      Setswana (South Africa) (tn-ZA):  SpecificCulture
*/
Imports System.Globalization

Module Module1
    Public Sub Main()
        ' Get and enumerate all cultures.
        Dim allCultures = CultureInfo.GetCultures(CultureTypes.AllCultures)
         For Each ci In allCultures
            ' Display the name of each culture.
            Console.Write($"{ci.EnglishName} ({ci.Name}): ")
            ' Indicate the culture type. 
            If ci.CultureTypes.HasFlag(CultureTypes.NeutralCultures) Then
               Console.Write(" NeutralCulture")
            End If   
            If ci.CultureTypes.HasFlag(CultureTypes.SpecificCultures) Then
               Console.Write(" SpecificCulture")
            End If   
            Console.WriteLine()
        Next
    End Sub  
End Module
' The following is a portion of the output from this example.
'            Tajik (tg):  NeutralCulture
'            Tajik (Cyrillic) (tg-Cyrl):  NeutralCulture
'            Tajik (Cyrillic, Tajikistan) (tg-Cyrl-TJ):  SpecificCulture
'            Thai (th):  NeutralCulture
'            Thai (Thailand) (th-TH):  SpecificCulture
'            Tigrinya (ti):  NeutralCulture
'            Tigrinya (Eritrea) (ti-ER):  SpecificCulture
'            Tigrinya (Ethiopia) (ti-ET):  SpecificCulture
'            Tigre (tig):  NeutralCulture
'            Tigre (Eritrea) (tig-ER):  SpecificCulture
'            Turkmen (tk):  NeutralCulture
'            Turkmen (Turkmenistan) (tk-TM):  SpecificCulture
'            Setswana (tn):  NeutralCulture
'            Setswana (Botswana) (tn-BW):  SpecificCulture
'            Setswana (South Africa) (tn-ZA):  SpecificCulture

The following example displays several properties of the neutral cultures.

using namespace System;
using namespace System::Globalization;
int main()
{
   
   // Displays several properties of the neutral cultures.
   Console::WriteLine( "CULTURE ISO ISO WIN DISPLAYNAME                              ENGLISHNAME" );
   System::Collections::IEnumerator^ enum0 = CultureInfo::GetCultures( CultureTypes::NeutralCultures )->GetEnumerator();
   while ( enum0->MoveNext() )
   {
      CultureInfo^ ci = safe_cast<CultureInfo^>(enum0->Current);
      Console::Write( "{0,-7}", ci->Name );
      Console::Write( " {0,-3}", ci->TwoLetterISOLanguageName );
      Console::Write( " {0,-3}", ci->ThreeLetterISOLanguageName );
      Console::Write( " {0,-3}", ci->ThreeLetterWindowsLanguageName );
      Console::Write( " {0,-40}", ci->DisplayName );
      Console::WriteLine( " {0,-40}", ci->EnglishName );
   }
}

/*
This code produces the following output.  This output has been cropped for brevity.

CULTURE ISO ISO WIN DISPLAYNAME                              ENGLISHNAME
ar      ar  ara ARA Arabic                                   Arabic                                  
bg      bg  bul BGR Bulgarian                                Bulgarian                               
ca      ca  cat CAT Catalan                                  Catalan                                 
zh-Hans zh  zho CHS Chinese (Simplified)                     Chinese (Simplified)                    
cs      cs  ces CSY Czech                                    Czech                                   
da      da  dan DAN Danish                                   Danish                                  
de      de  deu DEU German                                   German                                  
el      el  ell ELL Greek                                    Greek                                   
en      en  eng ENU English                                  English                                 
es      es  spa ESP Spanish                                  Spanish                                 
fi      fi  fin FIN Finnish                                  Finnish                                 
zh      zh  zho CHS Chinese                                  Chinese                                 
zh-Hant zh  zho CHT Chinese (Traditional)                    Chinese (Traditional)                   
zh-CHS  zh  zho CHS Chinese (Simplified) Legacy              Chinese (Simplified) Legacy             
zh-CHT  zh  zho CHT Chinese (Traditional) Legacy             Chinese (Traditional) Legacy            

*/
using System;
using System.Globalization;

public class SamplesCultureInfo
{

   public static void Main()
   {

      // Displays several properties of the neutral cultures.
      Console.WriteLine("CULTURE ISO ISO WIN DISPLAYNAME                              ENGLISHNAME");
      foreach (CultureInfo ci in CultureInfo.GetCultures(CultureTypes.NeutralCultures))
      {
         Console.Write("{0,-7}", ci.Name);
         Console.Write(" {0,-3}", ci.TwoLetterISOLanguageName);
         Console.Write(" {0,-3}", ci.ThreeLetterISOLanguageName);
         Console.Write(" {0,-3}", ci.ThreeLetterWindowsLanguageName);
         Console.Write(" {0,-40}", ci.DisplayName);
         Console.WriteLine(" {0,-40}", ci.EnglishName);
      }
   }
}


/*
This code produces the following output.  This output has been cropped for brevity.

CULTURE ISO ISO WIN DISPLAYNAME                              ENGLISHNAME
ar      ar  ara ARA Arabic                                   Arabic
bg      bg  bul BGR Bulgarian                                Bulgarian
ca      ca  cat CAT Catalan                                  Catalan
zh-Hans zh  zho CHS Chinese (Simplified)                     Chinese (Simplified)
cs      cs  ces CSY Czech                                    Czech
da      da  dan DAN Danish                                   Danish
de      de  deu DEU German                                   German
el      el  ell ELL Greek                                    Greek
en      en  eng ENU English                                  English
es      es  spa ESP Spanish                                  Spanish
fi      fi  fin FIN Finnish                                  Finnish
zh      zh  zho CHS Chinese                                  Chinese
zh-Hant zh  zho CHT Chinese (Traditional)                    Chinese (Traditional)
zh-CHS  zh  zho CHS Chinese (Simplified) Legacy              Chinese (Simplified) Legacy
zh-CHT  zh  zho CHT Chinese (Traditional) Legacy             Chinese (Traditional) Legacy

*/
Imports System.Globalization

Module Module1

   Public Sub Main()

      ' Displays several properties of the neutral cultures.
      Console.WriteLine("CULTURE ISO ISO WIN DISPLAYNAME                              ENGLISHNAME")
      Dim ci As CultureInfo
      For Each ci In CultureInfo.GetCultures(CultureTypes.NeutralCultures)
         Console.Write("{0,-7}", ci.Name)
         Console.Write(" {0,-3}", ci.TwoLetterISOLanguageName)
         Console.Write(" {0,-3}", ci.ThreeLetterISOLanguageName)
         Console.Write(" {0,-3}", ci.ThreeLetterWindowsLanguageName)
         Console.Write(" {0,-40}", ci.DisplayName)
         Console.WriteLine(" {0,-40}", ci.EnglishName)
      Next ci

   End Sub



'This code produces the following output.  This output has been cropped for brevity.
'
'CULTURE ISO ISO WIN DISPLAYNAME                              ENGLISHNAME
'ar      ar  ara ARA Arabic                                   Arabic                                  
'bg      bg  bul BGR Bulgarian                                Bulgarian                               
'ca      ca  cat CAT Catalan                                  Catalan                                 
'zh-Hans zh  zho CHS Chinese (Simplified)                     Chinese (Simplified)                    
'cs      cs  ces CSY Czech                                    Czech                                   
'da      da  dan DAN Danish                                   Danish                                  
'de      de  deu DEU German                                   German                                  
'el      el  ell ELL Greek                                    Greek                                   
'en      en  eng ENU English                                  English                                 
'es      es  spa ESP Spanish                                  Spanish                                 
'fi      fi  fin FIN Finnish                                  Finnish                                 
'zh      zh  zho CHS Chinese                                  Chinese                                 
'zh-Hant zh  zho CHT Chinese (Traditional)                    Chinese (Traditional)                   
'zh-CHS  zh  zho CHS Chinese (Simplified) Legacy              Chinese (Simplified) Legacy             
'zh-CHT  zh  zho CHT Chinese (Traditional) Legacy             Chinese (Traditional) Legacy            

End Module

Remarks

These culture type values are returned by the CultureInfo.CultureTypes property, and also serve as a filter that limits the cultures returned by the CultureInfo.GetCultures method. For more information on cultures, see CultureInfo.

Generally, you enumerate all cultures by using the CultureTypes.AllCultures value. This allows enumeration of custom cultures as well as the other culture types.

Note that all CultureTypes members have been deprecated except for CultureTypes.AllCultures, CultureTypes.NeutralCultures, and CultureTypes.SpecificCultures.

.NET recognizes the following culture types, all of which are included in enumerations returned by the CultureTypes.AllTypes enumeration member:

  • Specific cultures, which specify a country/region and a language. The names of these cultures follow RFC 4646. The format is <languagecode2>-<country/regioncode2>, where <languagecode2> is a lowercase two-letter code derived from ISO 639-1, and <country/regioncode2> is an uppercase two-letter code derived from ISO 3166. For example, "en-US" for English (United States) is a specific culture. Custom specific cultures (that is, cultures that are application- rather than system-defined) can have any user-specified name, not just a standards-compliant one.

  • Neutral cultures, which specify a language without respect to a country/region. The names of neutral cultures consist of the lowercase two-letter code derived from ISO 639-1. For example: "en" (English) is a neutral culture. Custom neutral cultures (that is, cultures that are application- rather than system-defined) can have any user-specified name, not just a two-letter code.

    The invariant culture is included in the array of cultures returned by the CultureInfo.GetCultures method that specifies this value.

  • Custom cultures, which are application-defined cultures. Custom cultures can represent either specific cultures or neutral cultures and can have any application-specified name.

    In Windows versions prior to Windows 10, the UserCustomCulture value is assigned to custom cultures created by the developer. In Windows 10, the UserCustomCulture value is also assigned to system cultures that are not backed by a complete set of cultural data and that do not have unique local identifiers. (All cultures of type UserCustomCulture share a CultureInfo.LCID value of LOCALE_CUSTOM_UNSPECIFIED (0x1000, or 4096)). As a result, the CultureInfo.GetCultures(CultureTypes.UserCustomCulture) method returns different sets of cultures on different Windows versions.

Applies to

See also