ranson@cnetlu.UUCP (Ranson) (06/16/89)
Apple has already done a lot to make the Mac international, but there
are yet many weaknesses that hurt even European users that use the same
roman script. I don't expect the following wish list to make it into
System 7.0, but I hope it will trigger some deep thinking.
+ The current system of international resources is flawed. It is too
rigid to accomodate smooth localization to European langages. Consider
for instance abbreviated dates. One cannot expect to abbreviate a month
name by taking the first n letters! In French, n =3, but since this gives
an ambiguity between Juin (June) and Juillet (July), the forms JUN and JUL
are used instead of JUI. The itl resources cannot do that.
+ We need better guidelines and support for keyboard use. Most US software
has dependencies on the US keyboard layout that cripple it when used with
other keyboards. Does Apple realize that even System software has such
dependencies? Just to name two, Command-period (to cancel printing) and
Command-Option-W (to close all Finder windows) cannot be typed on most
non-US keyboards. Hypercard alone has dozens of keyboard commands that don't
transpose easily to other keyboards. MPW has some too.
+ The Mac should not only be international, but MULTInational. Even on a
French System, I should be able to type a US style business letter, with
dates in the US format. Users need utilities to put several sets of inter-
national resources in their System, and developpers need support to use
these resources. I know of one multilingual word processor in which you
can assign a langage to a selection (as you would assign it a style). We
need something like that, but System-wide.
+ Now that IPC is around the corner, how about defining a standard interface
for spelling checkers and hyphenators? They could be purchased seperately
from word processors or similar systems, be shared between applications.
And international users would not have to wait for localized versions.
Obviously, some connection with the "langage as style" concept would be
needed.
Daniel Ranson
ranson@cnetlu.fr
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