Comments on: Quick Tips for Localizing Web Apps http://ryandoherty.net/2008/05/26/quick-tips-for-localizing-web-apps/ Web developer and performance engineer Mon, 15 Nov 2010 02:23:15 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 By: Ryanhttp://ryandoherty.net/2008/05/26/quick-tips-for-localizing-web-apps/comment-page-1/#comment-1175 Ryan Wed, 28 May 2008 06:00:46 +0000 http://www.ryandoherty.net/?p=260#comment-1175 @Jim Yeah, I agree with your comment about not using things like 'X' for variables, better to use what you mentioned. My point was more about how pluralization for 3 messages is different than pluralization for 10 in some languages. Gettext does support this, not sure about other localization tools. Regarding your article you linked to: At Yahoo!, we never stored any translations in a DB for real-time access. We generated a complete copy of our templates for each locale so there was no runtime performance hit. @Jim

Yeah, I agree with your comment about not using things like ‘X’ for variables, better to use what you mentioned. My point was more about how pluralization for 3 messages is different than pluralization for 10 in some languages. Gettext does support this, not sure about other localization tools.

Regarding your article you linked to:
At Yahoo!, we never stored any translations in a DB for real-time access. We generated a complete copy of our templates for each locale so there was no runtime performance hit.

]]> By: Jim Plushhttp://ryandoherty.net/2008/05/26/quick-tips-for-localizing-web-apps/comment-page-1/#comment-1174 Jim Plush Wed, 28 May 2008 05:45:35 +0000 http://www.ryandoherty.net/?p=260#comment-1174 @Brock, Ryan is correct about the pluralization issue. A good way of organizing your strings is to use tokens for variables so the localizer can replace them and rearrange them without having to know anything about your code something like "You have X new messages" could be stored as "You have %NUMBER_OF_MESSAGES% new messages" then the localizer could easily understand how to rearrange that as: spanish "usted tiene %NUMBER_OF_MESSAGES% nuevos mensajes" Portuguese "tem %NUMBER_OF_MESSAGES% novas mensagens" I have some of Ryan's tips and a few others in a post I made in 05 http://www.litfuel.net/plush/?postid=84 @Brock,
Ryan is correct about the pluralization issue. A good way of organizing your strings is to use tokens for variables so the localizer can replace them and rearrange them without having to know anything about your code

something like
“You have X new messages” could be stored as

“You have %NUMBER_OF_MESSAGES% new messages”

then the localizer could easily understand how to rearrange that as:

spanish
“usted tiene %NUMBER_OF_MESSAGES% nuevos mensajes”

Portuguese
“tem %NUMBER_OF_MESSAGES% novas mensagens”

I have some of Ryan’s tips and a few others in a post I made in 05
http://www.litfuel.net/plush/?postid=84

]]> By: Ryanhttp://ryandoherty.net/2008/05/26/quick-tips-for-localizing-web-apps/comment-page-1/#comment-1173 Ryan Tue, 27 May 2008 20:03:35 +0000 http://www.ryandoherty.net/?p=260#comment-1173 @Brock Yeah, some languages change their pluralization depending on the # of items they are talking about. See http://ed.agadak.net/2007/12/one-potato-two-potato-three-potato-four @Brock

Yeah, some languages change their pluralization depending on the # of items they are talking about.

See http://ed.agadak.net/2007/12/one-potato-two-potato-three-potato-four

]]> By: Brockhttp://ryandoherty.net/2008/05/26/quick-tips-for-localizing-web-apps/comment-page-1/#comment-1172 Brock Tue, 27 May 2008 19:51:48 +0000 http://www.ryandoherty.net/?p=260#comment-1172 Thankfully, I’ve never had to deal with any kind of localization, but I’m sure my day is coming. I’m curious about your “You have X new messages” example. What do you mean when you say there could be different translations? In some languages, does the wording of the sentence actually change if it’s more than, say, five messages?

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