RE: New FAQ for review: Using <select> to Link to Localized Content

Some (personal, of course) comments follow...

1. All in all, a very good FAQ article. Wish we had more like this.

2. I don't like the following sentence, which doesn't seem to convey any information germane the remainder of the article and would be happier if it went away:

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The term "global gateway" is frequently used to refer to the visual and technical devices that Web sites employ to direct visitors to their content.
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3. The following paragraph is slightly murky:

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The localized content pointed to may be an alternative country site, a translated version of a site or page, etc. In this article we avoid discussion of the best practises associated with pointing to translated and/or region specific sites; we look specifically at some of the pros and cons of using selection lists, for whatever purpose, and best practises if you think this approach is right for you. There are numerous other aspects to global navigation that will be described in other articles.
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a. It would be better to say for the second sentence "In this article we avoid discussing the best way to organize the information in order to concentrate on the pros and cons of using selection lists to choose the content."

b. The en-GB spelling "practises" appears here, whereas "practices" is correct en-US. Is there a guideline on which flavour we use :-)?

4. The following note should be in the background:

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Note that these recommendations do not apply to selection lists that are part of a form. For example, if you are filling in a form and selecting your country of residence or language from a list the selection list should be all in the language of the current page.
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5. There should be a comma in the second sentence quoted just above as well, following the phrase "from a list..."

6. The phrase "If your site supports only a handful of localizations" should probably use the less-jargonish "handful of language versions". I see that we use "localized" elsewhere, but 'localizations' might not convey the point as effectively.

7. There is no discussion of the 'value' attribute in the options. I think it should be mentioned that the value itself should be language neutral, regardless of whether you display localized values in one language or many. Perhaps a mention of RFC 3066 would be useful here? Recall that a select box by itself does nothing; the backend has to redirect the user on submit by processing the value.

Best Regards,

Addison

Addison P. Phillips
Globalization Architect, Quest Software
Chair, W3C Internationalization Core Working Group

Internationalization is not a feature.
It is an architecture. 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: www-international-request@w3.org [mailto:www-international-
> request@w3.org] On Behalf Of Richard Ishida
> Sent: 2005年7月6日 9:49
> To: www-international@w3.org
> Subject: New FAQ for review: Using <select> to Link to Localized Content
> 
> 
> 
> 
> http://www.w3.org/International/questions/qa-navigation-select

> 
> 
> Comments are being sought on this article prior to final release. Please
> send any comments to www-international@w3.org. We expect to publish a
> final version in one to two weeks.
> 
> 
> Description:
> The article makes suggestions with regard to best practices for using
> pull-down menus based on the select element to direct visitors to
> localized content.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ============
> Richard Ishida
> W3C
> 
> contact info:
> http://www.w3.org/People/Ishida/

> 
> W3C Internationalization:
> http://www.w3.org/International/

> 
> Publication blog:
> http://people.w3.org/rishida/blog/

> 
>

Received on Wednesday, 6 July 2005 20:25:08 UTC