Re: HELO

Here are (slightly more verbose) explinations from an internal paper we did at my Company
(this is a snippet, sorry for formatting):


GLOBALIZATION (G11N)

Globalization is the process of designing, developing, and marketing software
products that are linguistically and 
functionally useable across major international markets. Globally enabled
software has been carefully engineered to 
handle different languages and cultural conventions transparently within a
single source code model. The User 
Interface (UI), textual and graphical content, regional formatting conventions,
etc. are stored in resources or libraries 
separate from the source code. This allows products to be translated and
enabled for other languages and locales 
without reengineering or recompiling.

The term 'g11n' is synonymous with 'globalization'. In US-English
'globalization is spelled with a 'z', whereas UK-English uses an 's'. 'G11n' is
constructed of the first and last letters of the word with the number '11'
representing the eleven letters in between.  Not only does this shorthand
accommodate both UK and US English 
spellings, it reduces eyestrain when reading documentation on the subject. 

G11n involves two distinct activities: internationalization (i18n) and
localization (L10n).

INTERNATIONALIZATION (I18N)
Internationalization (i18n) is the process of designing and developing a single
software architecture that can address 
different linguistic and cultural components seamlessly at runtime. All data
sensitive to language and locale is 
separated from source code. The resulting language-independent and
locale-neutral source code is then protected 
from the translation process.  

LOCALIZATION (L10N)
Localization (L10n) is the process of developing linguistic and cultural data
resources that can be used by 
internationalized software at runtime. L10n focuses on translating and enabling
a product linguistically and 
functionally for a specific locale. Whereas i18n is concerned with the more
quantitative activities of engineering, 
L10n implies a qualitative inspection of language and textual and graphical
content.  

L10n issues include:
_ translation of language and graphical content
_ cultural appropriateness of textual and graphical content
_ use of proper formatting for dates, times, addresses, etc. in textual display
as well as forms
_ use of proper units of measure and currency
_ sort orders of alphabetically ordered lists
_ screen layouts
_ UI colors
_ icon usage conventions

I18N + L10N = G11N
The close inter-relationship of i18n and L10n activities warrants a clearly
delineated discussion of distinctions 
between the two modes. 
_ I18n focuses on language neutral and locale-independent parameters, while
L10n's concerns are single locale-
specific.
_ To separate all language and locale-sensitive data from source code (an i18n
activity) requires a cross-cultural 
knowledge base of how data types and formats may differ between languages and
locales (L10n knowledge 
spanning various L10n locales).
_ I18n is concerned with the systematic mapping of character sets of different
languages in relation to one another 
in a locale-impartial manner, while L10n is concerned with actual content
translation for end user display for a 
specific locale and in a precise character set. L10n content translation
includes altering textual and graphical 
content so that it carries culturally appropriate connotations.
_ I18n is concerned with creating enough structure to permit any particular
formatting convention, while L10n is 
concerned with enabling the appropriate formatting parameters pertaining to a
specific locale.

Cheers,
Kevin

On Thu, Feb 21, 2002 at 12:28:49PM -0600, Holmes F. Boroughf ([email protected]) said something similar to:
> At 4:39 PM +0800 2/21/02, Autrijus Tang wrote:
> >1) How is this different from -unicode?
> >2) Are l10n issues candidates for discussions as well?
> >3) The use.perl announcements states 'using Perl for i18n' as the purpose.
> >    What, exactly, does this mean?
> 
> Hi,
> 
>    Good questions. Perhaps the definitions quoted below will give some 
> additional background. It would seem that i18n, and l10n are the 
> topics of most interest to PERL coders. Unicode would be just a part 
> of the problems to be solved.
> 
> Holmes Boroughf
> 
> 
> From:  Sun Home > Developers > GADC > FAQ  at
>      http://www.sun.com/developers/gadc/faq/general.html
> >1.2 What are Globalization, Internationalization, and Localization?
> >     Globalization is a product development and marketing approach 
> >which ensures that
> >software products are usable in the world's major markets, and is acheived
> >through a combination of internationalization and localization.
> >     Internationalization is the process of designing and 
> >implementing software to
> >transparently handle different cultural and linguistic conventions without
> >additional modification.
> >     Localization is the process of developing cultural-specific 
> >software components
> >and translations that can be accessed by internationalized software 
> >at runtime.
> >Software must be internationalized before it is localized.
> >
> >1.3 What are G11N, I18N, and L10N?
> >Globalization, Internationalization, and Localization are commonly 
> >abbreviated as g11n, i18n, and l10n, using the number of letters 
> >between the first and last letter as a placeholder.
> >
> 
> -- 
-- 
[Writing CGI Applications with Perl - http://perlcgi-book.com]
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