[sci.astro] Internationalization of Software?

terrell@druhi.ATT.COM (TerrellE) (07/01/89)

I know that there are some modifications that I will have to perform to 
"internationalize" software products developed for use in the USA.  
These changes include the obvious (translate the program
and documentation into the right language).  However, some of the
other changes are more subtle.  I'm sure that I've overlooked some, but
here's what I have so far:

Necessary changes to "internationalize" a software product:

1.	Flexible date format:

	dd/mm/yy
	yy/dd/mm
	yy/mm/dd
	mm/dd/yy

2.	Handle foreign daylight savings time.

3.	Flexible radix (decimal) point (i.e. '.' or ','):

	3.14159
	3,14159

4.	Allow English or Metric units.

5.	Use "one thousand million" rather than "one billion".

6.	Flexible time format:

	hh:mm
	hh.mm
	hh'mm

7.	Allow either ' ' or ',' for thousands delimiters:

	1,000,000
	1 000 000
	

What else is necessary?  Overseas users:  what changes would you make
to your "US Version" software to make it approprate for use in other
countries?

I'll post a summary of the results.  Thanks in advance,



Eric Terrell	(att!druhi!terrell)

agollum@engr.uky.edu (Kenneth Herron) (07/02/89)

RBase (a database program for PC's) allows you to specify the currency
symbol used for currency values, as well as where it goes (before/after
the digits), and how many digits go to the right of the decimal (ie, two
for US dollars).  It also lets you customize the date and time formats to
your heart's content (You want AD and BC in your dates?  You got it!).

Most european users will be using ascii characters from the set above
127.  Don't use the high bit of char values for anything, and don't strip
it.  MS-DOS allows any character from the upper half of the character
set to be used in file names (In testing this statement, I just tried
to create a file called <alt-2-0-0>.txt (#200 is a graphics character).
The name was saved properly on my local floppy, but converted to H.TXT
on my novell netware directory).  Your hypothetical foreign user may
be using a keyboard driver to map the keyboard to his character set (and
even US users have the Dvorak set at their disposal) so don't do funny
things with the keyboard interrupt.

I believe characters #174 and #175 are quote characters in some languages.
Some of the high-bit letters are upper-case and some lower-case.  Some
have both cases represented, some do not.  ASCII order and alphabetical
order are not the same when considering these foreign characters.

One simple change is to let program messages and help text be read from
a file instead of being hard-coded into the program.  This lets your
foreign user translate messages himself.

Kenneth Herron

root@ambush.dk (Leif Andrew Rump) (07/02/89)

Make sure that your software is able to support 8 bit IBM ASCII and
not only 7 bit that only has [, \, ], {, |, and } because a _LOT_ of
european contries use special characters. For instance in Denmark we
use the concanation of: AE, OE, AA, ae, oe and AA (that is the old
writing style, now its: A and E put together, O with a slash, A with a
little circle on top, ae put together, o with a slash and a with a
little circle on top!). And that isn't that bad! If your application
is able to sort text THEN you got trouble!!! The three Danish letters
is just appended to the alphabet after Z but some other contries
insert characters different places!!!

  Leif Andrew Rump, AmbraSoft A/S, Roejelskaer 15, DK-2840 Holte, Denmark
 UUCP: leif@ambra.dk, phone: +45 42424 111, touch phone: +45 42422 817+313

   > > > Why are tall Irish girls with red hair so wonderful ? ? ? < < <

root@ambush.dk (Leif Andrew Rump) (07/03/89)

no b6 GMT
References: <4380@druhi.as IkOM>
Organization: AmbraSoft, Holte, Denmark
Lines: 15
Xref: att comp.sys.ibm.pc:958 sci.astro:63

Make sure that your software is able to support 8 bit IBM ASCII and
not only 7 bit that only has [, \, ], {, |, and } because a _LOTeuropean contries use special characters. For instance in Denmark we
use the concanation of: AE, OE, AA, ae, oe and AAwriting style, now its: A and E put together, O with a slash, A with a
little circle on top, ae put together, o with a slash and a with a
little circle on top!). And that isn't that bad! If your application
is able to sort text THEN you got trouble!!! The three Danish letters
is just appended to the alphabet after Z but some insert characters different places!!!

  Leif Andrew Rump, AmbraSoft A/S, Roejelskaer 15, DK-2840 Holte, Denmark
 UUCP: leif@ambra.dk, phone: +45 42424 111, touch phone: +45 42422 817+313

   > > > Why are tall Irish girls with red hair so wonderful ? ? ? < < <