Internationalization and Translatability for Beginners

Internationalization and Translatability
for Beginners
AGIS 09, University of Limerick, 21-September-2009
Ultan Ó Broin

© Ultan Ó Broin September 2009
About
• Ultan Ó Broin
• Microsoft and Oracle localization
and internationalization
• Oracle Applications User Experience
• Localization World, Multilingual Web Site,
Internationalization Roundtable Advisory
Boards
• Editorial Board Multilingual Magazine
• Blogos
• Social media use by disabled research
(TCD)
• Caveats about this presentation
• Personal perspective and opinion
• Not those of Oracle Corporation
• Don’t rush out and buy/sell ORCL stock as a result
• Copyright and usage
• Share-alike non-attribution non-commercial please
• Screenshots and images remain the copyright of respective owners
• Products and services may be trademarks of their respective owners
• Reproduction for promotional work for non-profit use is fine, but play nice and say where
you got the information and from whom (@ultan)
© Ultan Ó Broin 2009

Agenda: Internationalization and Translatability
• Definitions
• Organization and
process
• Internationalization
issues
• Character
Processing
• International Variables
• Translatability
• Tools and environments
• What makes sense for the little guy?
• Resources
© Oracle Corporation 2009

Presentation Objectives
• Software and documentation-centric
• Learn about internationalization (I18n) process
and responsibilities
• Understand core I18n issues
• Identify key I18n considerations for content
development
• Consider what makes sense for you
• Obtain resources for further investigation
• Global user experience

Internationalization Definitions
• “Internationalization is the process of designing a
product so that it can be easily localized without the
need for redesign… it is the process of designing and
implementing a product which is as culturally and
technically “neutral” as possible, and which can
therefore easily be localized for a specific culture or
cultures.”
Localization Industry Standards Association (http://:www.lisa.org, accessed 15 April 2007)

• “Internationalization is the process of re-engineering
any information product so that it can be easily
localized for export to any country in the world. An
internationalized information product consists of two
components: core information and international
variables.”
Nancy Hoft, International Technical Communication, 1995, p. 19
• Core information: Same code used by the same product in
different environments
• International variables: political, economic, social, religious,
educational, linguistic, technological – the localizable,
cultural, user experience elements

• “The process of making information technology
flexible enough to be used in different cultural and
linguistic environments without changing source
code.”
• “Allows choice of language and locale (collection of
language and cultural preferences).”
• “Internationalized and localized products provide
equivalent functionality to users in their own language
while observing their cultural conventions.”
Oracle University, Introduction to Product Globalization, 2001

• “Internationalization: The process of developing a
program core whose feature design and code design
don’t make assumptions based on a single language
or locale and whose source code base simplifies the
creation of different language editions of a program.”
Nadine Kano, Developing International Software, 1995, p. 4

Forget This
English
Is Just
Another
Language• Why assume it’s always written in English anyway?

Questions
• Can you translate any software?
• Should you?

Internationalization: Why?
• The user experience
• Communicate efficiently globally using language, customs,
symbols, conventions
• Facilitates cultural adaptation – localization (L10n),
customization
• Eliminates cultural bias
• Minimizes management
• Correct market functionality
• Allows for process efficiencies in development and
localization - scalability

I18n Costs
• Fix once at source during development
• Very costly to fix later
© LingoPort / Multilingual Magazine 2009

Internationalization: Why?
• Rationale
• You must localize
• Globalization
• Competition
• Market share
• Revenue
• Internet
• SimShip
• Legal requirements
• User experience, engagement, communication
© Salesforce.com 2007

I18n Myths Exploded
• “They all speak English”
• “Once it’s in the reader’s language, it’s OK”
• “Only the stuff they see needs attention”
• “Won’t be translated anyway, so no need”
• “Costs too much”
• “Fix it later - if we have to”
• “Wrote it in Japanese, so it’s fine”
• “It’s open source, whatever”
• “It’s Java”
• “We’re giving it away for free”
• “The user can translate it”

Example

Questions
• Global information sharing
• Can you afford not to internationalize?
• To sell? To communicate? To share information?
• Language matters, but it’s NOT enough.

Internationalization Process
• Internationalization is a development responsibility
• Designed
• Core practice
• Modularization
• Integrate process
• Build, test environments
• No linguistic expertise required

Internationalization Standards
• Some standards/guidelines for free
• Unicode, XML, Java, HTML and so on
• Ken Lunde CJVK Information Processing great overview
• Not enough
• Application of standards
• Educate developers
• Provide tools
• Enforce standards, audit
• Set priorities
• Determine warnings versus failures
• Common sense

Internationalization Standards Examples

Questions
• Which is better: forced or voluntary i18n?
• How might you sell i18n to developers?
• No lectures, slogans, linguistics

Internationalization Issues
• Character processing
• International variables
• Translatability

Character Processing
Character Sets
A character set is a collection of letters, numbers, punctuation
marks and signs which are needed to support the creation of text
in a language or languages
Set of Characters
P o
e
%
“
!
K
& #
+a
X
C
A
;
}
[
b
Y
o
~
5
Character Set A
Character Set B

Character Encoding
Encoding is the process of mapping a character to a
bit sequence used to represent the data on the
computer
H oe l l !
48 6f656c6c 21 © Oracle Corporation 2009

Single-Byte Character Sets
English language can be represented by
7 bits (ASCII)
To accommodate Western European languages,
an extra bit is required (256 characters)
! # $
Alphabet A Zto , a zto52
Numbers10 0 9to
Punctuations % ‘ ( )“ * +
- . /
[
? @,
^ _ { | } ~ ] `
; < =:
]
>
33

Multi-Byte Characters
To represent more than 256 characters, more than one byte
is used
Sample : Traditional Chinese Big5
fe c9a5 40 ac 21
!
ab a5a2 c5 6f

• “Native”
Character Sets
• ISO 8859-1
Windows-1250
CP852
Shift JIS
Big5
EUC-KR ...
• Different code
support
• Conflicts
• Gaps
• Multiple-tier /
differences

Unicode
• Multilingual character encoding standard
• Consistent way of encoding multilingual text data
internationally
• Foundation for global software
Arabic
Chinese FrenchEnglish
Japanese
German
Unicode

Unicode encoding UTF-16 and UTF-8
• UTF-16 is a two-byte fixed-length encoding scheme
• UTF-8 is variable length encoding scheme
UTF-8
Encoding
A
Latin1
CharSet
US-ASCII
CharSet
Character
41 41
c7N/A
N/A N/A 82
41
e3 81
87c3
UTF-16
Encoding
41
c7
30 42
00
00
English Alphabet
French Alphabet
Japanese

Character Processing Impact
Impact of Multi-Byte Character Sets
• Database column widths specified in bytes but
HTML form input fields specified in characters
• Committing mismatched data = error
Inserted value too large for the column
ID
NAME
NUMBER(3)
VARCHAR2(5)
Table Column Size
Input text field size
aaaaa

• Code conversion takes place during transfer of data between
tiers that use different encoding methods
• Code conversion required if different character sets exist in a
single system
• Code conversion number one issue?
ISO8859-6
ISO8859-6
to
UTF8
UTF8
to
ISO8859-6 UTF8
Sends to the server
Receives from the server © Oracle Corporation 2009

Use Unicode support for:
• Storing
• Inserting
• Editing
• Sorting
• Deleting
• Searching
• Wrapping
• Shaping
• Rendering
• ….
Text field length Table Column
VARCHAR2(5)aa
VARCHAR2(15)aa aa
Solution…
Enlarged UTF-8 database column size as three times than original

What Character Set to Use?
• Ah, Unicode
• But…
• Which one?
• And what about legacy content?
• Moving native to Unicode?
• Remember data conversion!

International Variables - Locale
• Numbers
• Dates
• Currencies
• Time and time zone
• Address format
• Name format
• Telephone number format
• Statutory compliance
• Language
• More…

Dates
• Different date formats for different locales

Numbers
Country Format
Numbers US 1,234,567.89
Finland 1.234.567,89
Korea 1’234’567,89
Germany 1.234.567,89
• Different number formats

Currency
• Different currencies worldwide

Others
• Salutation, Telephone, Address formats
• Sort orders (linguistic v logical,…)
• Units of Measure (Imperial, Metric)
• Calendar (Gregorian, Japanese, Islamic…)
• Business, legal rules (HRM, Financials,
Manufacturing)
• VAT
• Tax
• GAAP
• Statutory compliance
• SSN, PPS, IDs
• Sarbanes-Oxley
• Data protection, Privacy
• …

And of Course: Language
Source: Wikipedia.org entry on Internationalization and localization, accessed 15 April 2007

Locale Variables: Solutions
• Don’t hard-code
• Store independently (MLS)
• Rely on O/S language and country/region settings, ICU, NLS class
libraries to display
• Auto-detect, then allow user to select

Question
• Any other international variables you can think of?
• Reading Writing Direction (BiDi, Vertical)
• HTML DIR=“RTL”
• CSS direction
• unicode-bidi property

Translatability
Translatability means that the product can be translated
easily to another languages using an efficient, common
sense, scalable process

Translatability
< I N P U T n a m e = E x c h a n g e R a t e T y p e
t y p e = r a d i o v a l u e = U S E R < % i f
( ( c u r r e n c y R a d i o B u t t o n
= = n u l l ) | | c u r r e n c y R a d i o B u t t o n . e q u a l s ( " "
) | | c u r r e n c y R a d i o B u t t o n . e q u a l s ( " U S E R " ) )
o u t . p r i n t ( " C H E C K E D " ) ; % > > U s e r r a t e s
s p e c i f i e d i n t h e t a b l e b e l o w < / T D >
Externalization - separating strings from software
code makes translation safer and easier
Tokens
Context
MESSAGE_CODE MESSAGE_TEXT LANGUAGE
------------ ------------ ---------
HELLO Hello EN
HELLO JA
HELLO Bonjour F

Translatability
• Separation of structure and rendering
• Ready-made in some cases
• XML
• XSLT
• CSS
• File formats
• Minimize
• XLIFF
• Standardize where you can
• Context versus Preview
• Text formats
<trans-unit id="HcmPayBalTop_60FB2908EE5DCCCAE040D30A68810384V000">
<source>You can view a single balance (the accumulated result
of a payroll calculation) and groups of balances. Review balance
results to confirm that the payroll run has completed successfully, to
verify that a worker has the correct pay and amount of tax deducted,
and to check a balance before and after adjusting it.</source>
<note>Product feature: “HRM: Workforce Deployment”</note>
<note>Page title: "Search: Balances By Country"</note>
</trans-unit>

Ensure quality translation - allow for text expansion:
• 200-300% for less than 20 characters in US English
• 150% for 21-50 characters
• 130% for over 50 characters
• Technologies that allow
expansion
• Context description
Translatability
© Richard Ishida, 1999, Xerox, Designing International User Interfaces

Translatability
Tokens
• Replaceable run-time variables
• Efficient programming technique
• Dangerous to use for translated words and verbs
Correct: This purchase order must be approved.
Incorrect: This purchase order must be &ACTION.
• Use for non-translatables: file or server names, dates,
currency amounts, system user names, or numbers
• Shortcut can prove costly in long run
Problems with concatenation
• <string1>+<string2>=<string3>
T e r m i n a l i s o p e r a t i o n a l - > T e r m i n a l e s t o p e r a t i o n n e l
T e r m i n a l i s n o t o p e r a t i o n a l - > T e r m i n a l n ’ e s t p a s o p e r a t i o n n e l

Translatability
• Sorting Orders
• Don’t hard-code
• Manually Expensive
• O/S, DB collation
or generate w/ XSL
• Multilingual files
• Separate files
• Bilingual translation memories
• Easier maintenance
• Faster turnaround
• Translation kit structure
• Common, then folder for each language
• Reflect storage

Translatability
• Identifiers
• Use for leveraging, context security
• Scale
• Development, storage efficiencies too
<p>Traditional performance measurement systems
typically do not provide top managers with a comprehensive view of the
organization. The Balanced Scorecard is a performance measurement
methodology, developed by Kaplan and Norton, that exceeds the typical scope
of traditional performance measurement systems. The Balanced Scorecard
methodology links the financial goals of an enterprise with the drivers that
determine future success.</p>

Translatability
• Source Content
• Approved terminology
• Glossary and style guide
• Write for the intended audience
• Care with lang, cultural references,
humor…
• Active voice?
• Eliminate wordiness (cost,
time, user experience)
• Care with symbols,
characters, acronyms,
and other “shortcuts”
• Avoid temporary or placeholder text

Translatability
Cost Control
• Common sense
• Basic writing
standards
• Examples
Solution:
Not needed: You must enter the username that you
want to log on with.
(12 words saved)
Better : Save your work and continue.
Wordy: Click the Apply button to save your
work, and then Click the Continue button.
(9 words saved)

Translatability
Graphics
• Nonlocalizable if possible
• If not, externalize text (SVG, XLIFF, and so on)
• Store separately
• Single tool for authoring/L10n if possible
• Unicode fonts
• Allow resizing
• Care with images:
• Hands, Body Parts
• Flags, Maps
• People
• Directionality
• Color when associated with objects
Sound
• Nonlocalizable if possible
• Audio - > Recording timing, transitions

Translatability
i m p o r t j a v a . u t i l . L i s t R e s o u r c e B u n d l e ;
p u b l i c c l a s s O E X B u n d l e e x t e n d s L i s t R e s o u r c e B u n d l e
{
p u b l i c O b j e c t [ ] [ ] g e t C o n t e n t s ( ) {
r e t u r n c o n t e n t s ;
}
s t a t i c f i n a l O b j e c t [ ] [ ] c o n t e n t s = {
{ " E D I T D E T A I L S " , " E d i t D e t a i l s " } ,
{ " A D D T O C A R T " , " A d d t o C a r t " } ,
Images for buttons and labels generated from a translated text
file at run-time

Questions
• Can you think of other problematic graphics?
• Can you see what’s
wrong with this file?
What are the solutions?

Tools and Environments
• Development Tools “Baked-In” I18N
• Information Quality authoring (e.g., Acrolinx IQ Suite)
• Enforces terminology and style standards, reuse
• Write your own scripts for text processing
• Pseudotranslation tools
• Externalization
• Hard-coding
• Text expansion
• Tokens
• O/S, run-time exes
• Character set support
• Translation tool synergies
• Test with translated data, localized O/S and environments

Pseudotranslated Environments

For the Little Guy
• Don’t be intimidated by the “GILT Industry”
• Who can afford to pay for conferences, reports, tools?
• Use common sense
• Leverage what’s provided by technology for free
• Write well in English (no translation guidelines)
• Prioritize (graphics 5%? Don’t sweat it)
• Obtain pseudotranslations using Google Translate (AR, F, JA)
• Pseudotranslate using your translation tool
• Visually inspect on different browsers, platforms
• Make your own checklist, write your own tools
• Discount usability and I18n testing – black-team
• Social media
• Engage the community, volunteers
• Engineer for user participation and input
• Beg, borrow, steal ideas and tools
• If it works for you, go for it, but architect for expansion and scale

Resources
• Web
• www.w3c.org, www.xliff.org
• www.multilingual.com (plus guides)
• www.i18nguy.com
• www.globalyzer.com
• www.opentag.com
• Social Media
• Blogos
• LinkedIn (groups)
• @r12a, @localization, #agis09, #i18n on Twitter
• Publications
• Multilingual Magazine
• Lunde, K. 2008. CJKV Information Processing
• Hall, B. 2004. Globalization Handbook for the .NET Platform
• Savourel, Yves. 2001. XML Internationalization and Localization
• Graham, T. 2000. Unicode: A Primer
• Apple Computer Inc. 1992. Guide to Macintosh Software Localization

Summary
• Definitions
• Organizational and Process
• Internationalization Issues
• Tools, Environments
• … References

Contact Information
• Information
• ultan.obroin@oracle.com
• http://www.multilingualblog.com
• @localization
• Thank You
• Questions?

Internationalization and Translatability for Beginners

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