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Welcome

The phrase 'Hello' translated in different languages, surrounding the website's logo. The logo is a thought-bubble with the Earth's continents inside.

This website is a collection of notes and thoughts compiled by me, Leif Gehrmann. The topics are a mix of Internationalization (i18n) and localization (l10n), with a focus on software development. It's not a comprehensive guide, but it includes things that I think are worth discussing, especially when designing software for an audience that you might not be familiar with.

Disclaimer

I am not an expert in linguistics, culture, or even i18n software! I also have cultural biases which leads to false assumptions and blindspots.Therefore, anything on this website should not be used as a source of truth.

Do your own research and consult a real expert for the audience you want to engage with!

i18n and l10n?

There is a difference!

Internationalization (i18n) is when you are adding functionality in your product to support additional languages and regions.

Localization (l10n) is when you are updating your existing product to support a new language, region, or locale.

For example, adding a system to switch between languages is internationalization, but doing the work of translating the text to a new language is localization.

For more info, see Wikipedia's article on Internationalization and localization.

This website has many articles, but here's a select few that I recommend everyone should read.