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
(Boroughf(_dot_)HF(_at_)acm(_dot_)org) 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]
I went to a general store. They wouldn't let me buy anything
specifically.
-- Steven Wright
