Professional iPhone® Programming with MonoTouch and .NET/C#

Chapter 12. Localizing for an International Audience

WHAT'S IN THIS CHAPTER?

• Defining internationalization and localization

• Displaying translated text and images

• Formatting dates, times, and numbers

• Extracting text for translation

Localization and internationalization sound similar; however, they describe different parts of the multilingual software development process.

Internationalization describes the writing of software that supports multiple languages and display formatting. It is a task generally undertaken by software architects and developers and influences the way that applications store and represent their user interface and data. Attributes of internationalized code include:

• All display text is stored separately from the code, so that it is easy to update.

• Images, videos, colors, and icons are easily updatable.

• Sorting of lists is language-sensitive.

• Date and time formatting (and measurement) and time calculations take the current user's settings into account.

• Number and currency formats (symbols, commas, and points) are flexible and appropriate for the user.

• Measurements (temperature, weight, distance) can be represented in different units.

• Appropriate input and display of addresses, telephone numbers, and government identification numbers.

It should be possible to release an internationalized application in many different countries/languages, once it has been localized.

Localization is the process of translating the text into a target language, updating images and other cultural references. ...