Re: dynamic language switching

Hi Erik,

	I have to emphasize what Chris Lilley said below.  Its a
headache for our IS people in overseas offices to have to track,
license, maintain, and use separate versions of Netscape for the local
language.  Its also a headache for the users who have to wait for the
e.g. Japanese version while every one else has the newest Englsh
version.  (I suspect some of them may therefore be experimenting with
a certain non-corporate standard browser that is released with the
localized OS...)  On a corporate intranet, you have to use a common
set of html features company-wide, so version/bug skew can also delay
deployment of intranet pages by authors back at HQ in the US.

Mark

> On Nov 25,  8:04pm, Erik van der Poel wrote:
> 
> > At the Sevilla conference last week, a few mentioned the need to be able
> > to dynamically switch the language of the client's menus and so on. I'd
> > like to hear a few examples of situations where this is really needed
> > (as opposed to just being "nice").
> 
> The example that was mentioned at the time was large corporates who
> just have to order 10,000 browsers rather than 2,168 English ones,
> 2,345 French ones .... and have to deal with all those browsers being
> slightly different code bases, the English versions are at 3.1.2 but
> the German one is 3.0.8 which had the unfortunate bug, fixed in 3.0.9
> and the Arabic ones are still at  2.9.7
> 
> In other words, it is a substantial administrative headache solved and
> large corporates like that sort of thing. You know, the ones that are
> still using Win 3.11 because until *all* the PCs can be upgraded to
> Win95 they would rather wait. I need hardly add that these are the
> customers who actually pay for browsers, in quantity, rather than just
> downloading them for free.
> 
> The other example mentioned at the time was switching the user interface
> language for client demonstrations.
> 
> A further example, not mentioned at the time, is the public access
> terminal or kiosk - internet cafes, tourist information services,
> library terminals, hotel room terminals. Any situation in fact where
> the machine and the browser stays put and there are multiple users.
> 
> In other words, its a strong USP in an international market and generates
> sales revenue.
> 
> -- 
> Chris Lilley, W3C                          [ http://www.w3.org/ ]
> Graphics and Fonts Guy            The World Wide Web Consortium
> http://www.w3.org/people/chris/              INRIA,  Projet W3C
> chris@w3.org                       2004 Rt des Lucioles / BP 93
> +33 (0)4 93 65 79 87       06902 Sophia Antipolis Cedex, France

Received on Tuesday, 26 November 1996 14:25:54 UTC