1. Creating a Plan for
Internationalization and
Localization
Tuesday, October 10, 2011
Adam Asnes Kent Grave
CEO, Lingoport Localization Manager
adam@lingoport.com Cisco Systems
@adamasnes

2. Lingoport
• Internationalization Services
– Assessment
– Project planning
– I18n development
– I18n testing
– Localization integration
• Globalyzer
– Internationalization software
• Find and fix i18n issues in code
• Support developer teams

3. Globalization
• Globalization (g11n) has two components :
– Internationalization (i18n) : software engineering to
enable localization – Global Scalability
– Localization (L10n): culture specific resources
(translation, etc.) – Market Specificity

4. Nobody Globalizes Just Cause It’s Cool
• We love revisiting code we’ve already developed
and paying tons of money to translators!
• Distracting from “Real Work”

5. Developers: Is It Internationalized?
• Most don’t know the answer
• Developers often underestimate i18n
requirements
– Just string externalization, right?
• Agile or other feature and release requirements
often overrun less formally measured i18n
requirements
• There is a Management Value in being able to
confirm global readiness

6. Organization Issues
• Lots to lose in time, revenue, costs, user
experience and product acceptance when code
isn’t well internationalized
• Few systematic tools and support for global-
ready software development & Localization
• Development moves fast, teams can be diverse
– Got Agile?
• Poor understanding of requirements

7. Internationalization is Expensive!
• After development • During development
– $100’s of thousands – Incidental, but still real
and more for serious costs
applications – Processes
– Must revisit existing – Forethought
code – Requirements
– Months to years delay – Measurement

8. Sobering Experience
• 1 million line app?
– $500K+ dev 18n costs PLUS localization
– 6 months? Much more? Big delays?
• When presented with i18n costs, timeframes,
risk
– Many projects die
– Many postponed
– Some companies fade away

9. Creating an actionable plan
GETTING ORGANIZED

10. Assessment and Plan Building
• What’s in code • What’s not in code
– Strings – Requirements
– Locale-unsafe – Locale Handling
functions/methods – Data operations
– Programming Patterns – Database schema
– Static References

11. Traditional Approach - repeat, and repeat, and repeat, and repeat
Localize and see what
you’re missing
Ad-hoc scripts,
Test, Pseudo-Localize
overwhelm developers
View pages. Pore over
Externalize and refactor code for strings,
one by one methods, etc.

12. Maintenance of the i18n Process
Maintenance of the i18n Process
STRING IDENTIFICATION
QA Engineering
Pseudo-Localization
Go through QA report
Going through each screen
Sift through code to find non-
Identify which string is pseudo-
externalized strings
localized
Report back to QA
Report back to engineering
LOCALE SENSITIVE METHOD IDENTIFICATION
QA Engineering
Go through each screen,
file, report, checking for: Go through QA report
Character operation Sift through code to find Origin
Collation of issue
Conversion Report back to QA,
Date/Time management
File & Path
Locale and Character set
2 weeks
Number Format GLOBALYZER SCANS AND
Automated
Process control functions REPORTING
String operations
Scan, report & distribute
GENERAL PATTERNS
QA Engineering
Go through QA report
Sift through code to find Origin
Go through each screen, of issue
file, report, checking for: Report back to QA,
Font management
Characters
Database patterns
STATIC FILE REFERENCES
QA Engineering
Go through QA report
Go through each screen, Sift through code to find Origin
file, report, checking for: of issue
video Report back to QA,
images management
contracts
html
configuration files

13. Globalyzer Server and Clients
Server
Client Command Line

14. Create a Plan
• Tasks
• Schedule
• Staffing
• Costs
• Requirements doc, assessment or best practices
are not a plan

15. ONGOING
GLOBALIZATION

16. Teams Are Small and Distributed
Source: Antelink software development survey,
antelink.com

17. Organizational Perceptions of G11n
Developers: L10n Managers:
•Straightforward, simple, •Issues come up with
handled every release
•Tier 3 bugs, at best •Tier 1,2 &3 bugs
•Features come first •Not enough support
•Not enough time from dev.
•No way to verify until
localization
•Lack deep knowledge
of code
Business Managers:
•Sales/biz expectations
•Time to market
•Over budget and late

18. Ongoing i18n
• Make measuring i18n part of an ongoing
process, like a nightly build
• Regular requirement for development – part of
every cycle, agile or otherwise
• Build an i18n testing strategy that leverages
Localization testing as well.
– Pseudo-locales

19. Catch Bugs Early!
Source: “Software Internationalization Tools and Solutions” - Xerox
30 x
Architecture and Design
Acceptance
15 x
Requirements
7x
Testing
Maintenance
Localization
Coding
4x
2x
Development Phase when
an I18N bug is detected

20. Ongoing Globalization
• Focus on leveraging expertise
– Tools help you scale
– Staff experts
– Training
– Keep repeating the globalization value message
– Get help repeating the message
– Fight Entropy!

21. Questions & Answers
Adam Asnes Resources
adam@lingoport.com http://www.lingoport.com
Twitter: @adamasnes
Globalyzer
Kent Grave http://www.globalyzer.com
Cisco Systems
Blog
http://i18nblog.com
•Contact us for a detailed individual presentation, or i18n needs discussion
•Try Globalyzer at http://globalyzer.com