I18n Verification Checklist

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8.1

If your product is internationalized correctly, then localization (L10n) should mainly consist of translating all Translatables and configuring the product. To test the ease of L10n, first prepare a Localization Guide. Then, follow the guide and do a sample L10n by either adding prefixes and suffixes. For more information see Section 3.2, Messages.

8.2

The L10n Guide contains the instructions for localizing a product. The policies contained with an L10n Guide are product- or company-dependent. An accurate, high-quality set of instructions and utilities will ensure a successful localization of the product. Consider these questions:

• Are the files and packages provided correct and complete?
• Can the files be extracted correctly?
• Are the tools and documents needed for any special pre- or post-processing of translated files provided? Do they work?
• Are file naming conventions and installation locations for the translated files specified correctly?
• Does following the instructions cause the files to be repackaged and received so they can be put back in the product properly?
• What is packaged in the base versus the localized versions of a product? (Typically the localized version only contains translatables and configurations for the locale and not the binaries or libraries of the product.)

The Example L10n Guide (below) shows some of the kinds of instructions you can deliver to those who localize your product. While not a complete document, this sample guide can act as a template for your own document. Within this document, you will find references to tools that you can provide to localizers, to assist them in tasks suchas generating Java message class files from textual property files.

8.3

Introduction

This document covers the various localizable issues of YourProduct 1.0. It describes in detail the various localizable components of YourProduct 1.0, and give instructions as to how to work with and localize these components. It is intended to be used by the localization centers to localize YourProduct, and is not meant for end users or developers.

Contents

• ** Fill in here **
• Appendix A : Locale Names used in YourProduct

Message files

Solaris *.po

These files should be converted to *.mo and placed in the right locale directory. This type of files will be placed in locale directories that uses "Solaris" locale names.

Example (messages file for Solaris start-up script):

• delivered location:

  /YourProduct/lib/locale/C/LC_MESSAGES/msg.po

• for ja locale:

  /YourProduct/lib/locale/ja/LC_MESSAGES/msg.mo

properties files

Localization centers should localize the values of the properties.

YourProduct contains many different types of properties. This section describes those properties that are part of the main tool. Information on the other types of properties can be found at:

• YourProduct Component properties (in the section "YourProduct Components" in this document)
• 3rd Party Component properties (in the section "3rd Party Components" in this document)

There are 2 types of localizable properties files, which are differentiated by the "-i18n" or "-messages" that appear before the ".properties" in their filenames. Any files without "-i18n" or "-messages" should not be touched. For the rest, use the following rules:

• xxxxx-i18n.properties

  localizable non-messages - these property files should NOT be translated but the values should be modified if needed

• xxxxx-messages.properties

  localizable messages - these property files should be translated

The YourProduct engineering team has created a tool for converting these properties files into a ".class" file format.

Please see the "loose file" package for details. The loose file package contains READMEs that provide step by step instructions on translating properties files. The README you want to follow is: loctoolsdir/translation-helper/messages/README.

Documentation

hard copy

• installation guide
• YourProduct information
• registration form

online documentation

• ** fill in here **

All html, gif, and other image files that are used by the online docs with original location as: YourProduct1.0/YourProduct/lib/XXX/... should be placed in the following directory in ja locale: YourProduct1.0/YourProduct/lib/locale/ja/lib/XXX/...

Special Files

** Fill in here **

3rd Party Components

The 3rd party components' properties kit is now located in: loctoolsdir/translation-helper/3pcomps

This directory contains a README that should be read and followed.

Text Files

YourProduct also includes legal text files.

YourProductC should translate these files from the delivered location: YourProduct1.0/YourProduct/lib/License.txt

Examples

YourProduct comes with a number of example code in YourProduct1.0/YourProduct/examples.

• delivered location:

  YourProduct1.0/YourProduct/examples

• ja locale:

  YourProduct1.0/YourProduct/examples/ja

Note: all localized examples must live under the directory YourProduct1.0/YourProduct/examples/<locale>

Tutorial Images

This section covers instructions on how to replace the images in the tutorial with locale specific images. If the existing images are satisfactory, then you do not have to change them but you may wish to replace the existing images with new ones as some images contain English text.

eReg/Comments Properties information

** Fill in here **

YourProductHelp Localization

This section will describe in detail the various localizable components of YourProductHelp, and give instructions as to how to work with and localize these components. It is intended to be used by the localization centers to localize the YourProductHelp used in YourProduct, and is not meant for end users or developers.

Special tools provided by YourProduct team for L10n work are delivered in the help/translation-helper directory (please see help.tar.Z).

• setup-translation

  This will set up a work area to localize property files. Please see help/translation-helper/messages/README for details and an example of use.

• l10n-properties-to-class

  This is the tool that will convert properties file to class files. Please see the readme instructions of this tool for detail.

Help Index Generation

The YourProduct engineering team has put together a tool for generating theindex search database. This tool can be found in: loctoolsdir/translation-helper/helpindex.

Appendix A: Locale Names used in YourProduct

Asian Locale Names

For Solaris:
								Arch.
	Item			japan	PRC	Taiwan	Korean 	dependent
	----			-----	---	------	------	---------
 
	(start-up)
 
	doc			ja	zh	zh_TW	ko	no
	(.html, .gif)
 
	doc			ja	zh	zh_TW	ko	yes
	(.txt)
 
	properties file   	ja	zh	zh_TW	ko	no
 
	examples   		ja	zh	zh_TW	ko	no
 
 
For Win32:
								Arch
	Item			japan	PRC	Taiwan	Korean	dependent
	----			-----	---	------	------	---------
	
	messags.po		ja_JP	zh_CN	zh_TW	ko	yes
	(start-up)
 
	doc			ja_JP	zh_CN	zh_TW	ko	no
	(.html, .gif)
 
	doc			ja_JP	zh_CN	zh_TW	ko	yes
	(.txt)
 
	properties file		ja_JP	zh_CN	zh_TW	ko	no
 
	examples		ja	zh	zh_TW	ko	no
 

European Locale Names

For Solaris:
								Arch.
	Item		France	Germany	Itay	Sweden	Spanish	dependent
	----		------	-------	----	-------	-------	---------
	(start-up)
 
	doc		  fr	de	it	sv	es	no
	(.html, .gif)
 
	doc		  fr	de	it	sv	es	yes
	(.txt)
 
	properties file   fr	de	it	sv	es	no
 
	examples   	  fr	de	it	sv	es	no
 
 
For Win32:
								Arch.
	Item		France	Germany	Italy	Sweden	Spanish	dependent
	----		------	-------	-----	-------	------- ---------
	messags.po	  fr	de	it	sv	es	yes
	(start-up)
 
	doc		  fr	de	it	sv	es	no
	(.html, .gif)
 
	doc		  fr	de	it	sv	es	yes
	(.txt)
 
	properties file	  fr	de	it	sv	es	no
 
	examples	  fr	de	it	sv	es	no