Internationalization: *current* locale and localized keystrokes

[Karsten Wutzke]

Hello all!

If have two questions:

1. What is the call to set the CURRENT locale? And I mean current, not
default. In my app, the user will have the choice of selecting any
language s/he wants (which has a reason).

2. Is it a best practice to localize key strokes? Localizing button/
action names, tooltips and mnemonics seem self-explanatory, but what
about keystrokes?

Example:

English: "User Data" -> Ctrl-U
German: "Benutzerdaten" -> Ctrl-B

As far as I can see even very popular apps don't localize them, as
seen in my German Firefox where there are:

Ctrl-P for "Print" (in German this "should be" "Drucken" -> Ctrl-D)
Ctrl-F for "Find" (in German this "should be" "Seite durchsuchen" ->
Ctrl-S? Ctrl-D? Ctrl-F?)

Here, Ctrl-S would collide with the "Save" operation, Ctrl-D would
collide with "Add bookmark" operation (if it existed)... all users
used to these shortcuts will definitely be frustrated. Also think of
all the operations:

Ctrl-Z Undo
Ctrl-Y Redo
Ctrl-X Cut
Ctrl-C Copy
Ctrl-V Paste

What are the further pros/cons? What is the common practice?

My personal opinion is rather against localizing keystrokes, but if
the arguments are right, I'm ready to change my mind...

Karsten

 

[Ricardo Palomares Martinez]

Karsten Wutzke escribió:

2. Is it a best practice to localize key strokes? Localizing button/
action names, tooltips and mnemonics seem self-explanatory, but what
about keystrokes?

(...)
My personal opinion is rather against localizing keystrokes, but if
the arguments are right, I'm ready to change my mind...

A bit OT here, but anyway...

Microsoft has the nasty habit of localizing shortcuts, and
OpenOffice.org sadly has bitten the bait, but I strongly oppose to it
(I volunteer to translate Mozilla applications) and, as a matter of
fact, is a Mozilla Localization policy NOT to translate shortcuts. To
the best of my knowledge, most software makers seem to honor this and
don't translate shortcuts.

Of course, translating accesskeys (mnemonics), like _F_ile ->
_A_rchivo, is a completely different thing, and we strive to get all
of them correctly localized so the final accesskey belongs to the
associated label.

HTH

 

[Karsten Wutzke]

Karsten Wutzke escribió:



A bit OT here, but anyway...

Microsoft has the nasty habit of localizing shortcuts, and
OpenOffice.org sadly has bitten the bait, but I strongly oppose to it
(I volunteer to translate Mozilla applications) and, as a matter of
fact, is a Mozilla Localization policy NOT to translate shortcuts. To
the best of my knowledge, most software makers seem to honor this and
don't translate shortcuts.

Of course, translating accesskeys (mnemonics), like _F_ile ->
_A_rchivo, is a completely different thing, and we strive to get all
of them correctly localized so the final accesskey belongs to the
associated label.

HTH

Veery helpful thanks a lot!

Karsten