Related Links - A Resources Page for Software I18N

Organisations

GALA (Globalization And Localization Association) is a fully representative, non-profit, international industry is a fully representative, non-profit, international industry association for the translation, internationalization, localization, and globalization industry. The association gives members a common forum to discuss issues, create innovative solutions, promote the industry, and offer its clients unique, collaborative value.On April 15, 2002, the Globalization and Localization Association (GALA) was created by 15 localization companies from 12 countries on four continents.

LISA (Localization Industry Standards Association) is the premier professional organization for the GILT (Globalization, Internationalization, Localization, and Translation) business community. With more than 400 members from the high-tech and vertical market sectors, LISA is well-known for its best practice guidelines for language technology standards and enterprise globalization.

LRC (Localisation Research Centre) provides a comprehensive information service to the industry; conducts research and development in localisation and related areas, such as language engineering; organises regular conferences and meetings; produces a range of publications including Localisation Focus; and oversees a number of education and training programs.

OASIS (Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards) is a not-for-profit, global consortium that drives the development, convergence and adoption of e-business standards. OASIS operates XML.org, a community clearinghouse for XML application schemas, vocabularies and related documents.

OpenI18N (Open Internationalization Workgroup) is a workgroup of the Free Standards Group with the goal to propose and coordinate any techniques, conventions, guidelines and activities within the open-source community. The scope of OpenI18N is focused on software/application portability and interoperability in the international context. This workgroup aims to provide a common open-source environment where applications can be executed and behave correctly worldwide, with different scripts, cultures and languages.

Books

Esselink, Bert. A practical Guide to Localization. John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2000, ISBN 1-58811-006-0

International, Dr. (Editor). Developing International Software. Microsoft Press, 2002, ISBN 0-73561-583-7

International Technical Support Organization. e-business Globalization Solution Design Guide:Getting Started. IBM Redbook, 2002,SG24-6851-00

Savourel, Yves. XML Internationalization and Localization. Sams publishing, 2001, ISBN 0-672-32096-7

Journals

Multilingual Computing and Technology, www.multilingual.com

Papers On-line

Using XML For Localization, by Yves Savourel, RWS Group
How to take advantage of XML in the localization process.

Cover Pages: Translation Memory Exchange
A technology report on TMX, with many references, sponsored by OASIS.

The Importance of TMX, by David Pooley, SDL International
A brief history, description and a discussion of the benefits of TMX.

Cover Pages: XML Localization Interchange File Format (XLIFF)
A technology report on XLIFF, with many references, sponsored by OASIS.
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Standards

TBX (TermBase eXchange) is an open XML-based standard format for terminological data.

TMX (Translation Memory eXchange) is a standard format for the interchange of translation memory data. The standard is maintained by OSCAR (Open Standards for Container/Content Allowing Reuse), a special interest group of LISA (Localization Industry Standards Association). TMX is XML compliant.

Unicode is a character coding system designed to support the worldwide interchange, processing, and display of the written texts of the diverse languages and technical disciplines of the modern world. In addition, it supports classical and historical texts of many written languages.

XLIFF (XML Localisation Interchange File Format) is a standard format for the interchange of localisation data. The standard is maintained by OASIS (The Organisation for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards). As the name implies, the standard is XML compliant

For more standards relevant to Internationalisation and Localisation please refer to LISA's Industry Standards.

Resource Sites

i18nGurus.com
Open directory of links to internationalization (i18n) resources and related material.

opentag.com
This site is dedicated to the tools and technologies used in the localization of software, on-line help and documentation. Its aim is to provide you with any type of information or data that could help you to streamline your localization processes.
This site provides helpful information on the XLIFF standard.

Open Source Projects

ICU (International Components for Unicode)
The International Components for Unicode (ICU) libraries provide robust and full-featured Unicode services on a wide variety of platforms. ICU supports the most current version of the Unicode standard, and they provide support for supplementary Unicode characters (needed for GB 18030 repertoire support).

Okapi
The Okapi Framework is a set of components, guidelines, APIs, and other elements that provide ways to make the different steps of the translation and localization process more interoperable.
It includes an XSL Template Collection containing a set of XSL transformation and presentation templates providing various utilities to manipulate or present XLIFF, TMX and other XML documents.