Does JavaScript take local decimal separators into account?

Question

I\'ve got a web page that displays decimals in a user\'s localized format, like so:

• English: 7.75
• Dutch: 7,75

Answer 1

No, decimal separators are not localized at all in JavaScript, and parseFloat() parses numbers in the same format as you need to use in JavaScript source code: “.” as decimal separator, no group (thousands) separator, “E” or “e” as “times ten to power” symbol, and Ascii hyphen “-” as minus sign.

To read or write numbers in localized format, you need something else. I would recommend the Globalize.js library, unless you can limit yourself to the single issue of decimal separator and a limited number of languages—in that case, it might be simpler to do just string manipulation that maps “.” to “,” on output and vice versa on input.