Localization

[André Wösten]

Hi all,

in terms of issue #28
http://code.google.com/p/musikcube/issues/detail?id=28 I coded a Config
class (basically an .INI file reader/writer) for win32cpp. Using this we
and users are able to create simple .ini files with the translations, so
we can get the internationalization running. Naturally this class
supports unicode, thus we can cover all languages.

Now, what about the localization - what is needed for this? Please
extend following list by your ideas:

* Date/Time (the config defines format strings)
* Possible fonts and charsets for the language
* Time zone
* Formatting of numbers (decimal points etc.)

Best regards,
André

[Björn Olievier]

Hi André,

I'm by no means a localization expert but I think left-to-right/right-to-left reading is part of it too.  Which opens a whole new can of worms.

The real question is how far we should take this localization.  I think translations and date formats are a good start.  Do we need the other stuff (do time zones matter in a media player)?  If so, do we need it now?  Is anyone of us familiar with non Western languages and localization?  It's probably hard to get it right if we don't know much about that.

I guess I'm trying to assess the effort to implement it and the risk of getting it wrong.

Best regards,
Björn

[Daniel Önnerby]

I agree with you Björn.
To get started we only need the translation and the date/time format. So lets just focus to get them up and running and we'll worry about the other stuff when that time comes.
Although, this is win32cpp stuff, so it may be used by other applications in the future that will need some other stuff. But that's a whole other mater :)

Best regards
Daniel

[Björn Olievier]

If other applications want to use win32cpp and they need localization support we will have a real use case and probably a better understanding what is required.  Maybe even people who could help.  I think at this point we don't know enough about what needs to be done.

On the other hand, not having decent localization support could be an argument to dismiss the library.  Anyone interested in doing a risk/reward analysis? :)

Björn