Is it possible to launch a program in a specific language?

Question

I'm a developer, and my primary language is French, so I use Mac OS X in French. However, I need on a regular basis to open an application in English to do support.

Right now I'm going to the International System Preferences and I put English above in the languages list, then I open the app I need to run in English. When I'm done, I switch it back to French.

This is an annoying process. Is there something else I can use, like a command-line program, to launch an application in a specific language?

Answer 1

There is a freeware, Language Switcher, to launch a single application with a different languages.

it's really simple and work amazingly.

Answer 2

You can change the language inside the preferences file of the application :

defaults write com.apple.TextEdit AppleLanguages '("en-US")'

Or just run once one application with another language :

/Applications/iCal.app/Contents/MacOS/iCal -AppleLanguages '(de)'

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To determine the bundle identifier, run

mdls -name kMDItemCFBundleIdentifier /Applications/Mail.app

or directly in one command:

defaults write $(mdls -name kMDItemCFBundleIdentifier -raw /Applications/Mail.app) AppleLanguages '("en-UK")'

(via SuperUser)

Answer 3

Go to the app, Press Command + I and if there are other languages they will show up in the info page. Just untick all except the language you want

Answer 4

For Google Chrome do this:

defaults write com.google.Chrome AppleLanguages '("en-US")'

Answer 5

I also found this to work:

bash-3.2$ LANG=de.UTF-8
bash-3.2$ /Applications/MuseScore\ 3.app/Contents/MacOS/mscore 

Answer 6

In the Finder, get info on the application. There are languages here, and you can choose. Alas, this seems to have disappeared in Snow Leopard.