本地化的软件架构

Question

We are currently bringing an online business software to other EU markets, where not only language but also rules and regulations differ from country to country which made me wonder, what is the best way to implement such in a software?

The UI localization isn't really a problem - done that more times then I could care to count, but for example while invoicing countries tend to require different data (well not totally different, but different enough to make you think about it architecture wise) meaning different inputs, different validations and somewhat different handling of that data.

Which way can be considered better?

• The standard way of localizing UI and adding the needed conditional statements for showing extra and hiding non-essential elements with similar conditionals in the Controller classes
• Creating a copy of the app for the given country with slightly altered controllers and views (which will make the constant updates a nightmare, but the code much cleaner)
• Trying to somehow create a Factory/Builder pattern around this?

While the last one sounds most reasonable to me, it frustrates me even more, as I have no clue on where to start yet. Any good pointers on that?

Language of the choice is PHP with Laravel

Answer 1

Definitely do not make different copies.

Have a look at your current database architecture and see how you can expand it to fulfill your requirements. Then rewrite or update the business-logic code layer of your application.

Then you will only need to make minor adjustments in the front-end.