What Is Globalization?

That's an easy question to answerglobalization is simply deploying an I18N-ready application across several locales, no matter what some harebrained economists think. What's I18N? We're getting ahead of ourselves a bit here, so let's first define some terminology so we can actually understand the globalization concept.

"Secret" Globalization Language Revealed

I'm going to let you in on one of the most guarded "secrets" in the world of software globalization (and probably have to go into hiding as a result. I'm going to define the terms that folks in the industry use to communicate among themselves.

• Locale is the most fundamental part of globalization. Locales are languages and other cultural norms (calendars; date, number, and currency formatting; spelling; writing system direction; and so forth) that are specific to a geographic region. The French used in Quebec is not exactly the same as the French used in Paris. Both HTML and XML define locales rather plainly as "language-country"that is, only as a basic language identifier (though it can encompass such things as "en-scouse," the English Liverpudlian dialect known as "Scouse"). Java, and by extension ColdFusion, include other cultural information that is locale specific.

• Internationalization or I18N (I18N is an abbreviation for the 18 letters between the i and n in internationalization) refers to the design and development of an application so that it functions in at least two locales. You can think of I18N as making an application language or locale neutral.

• Localization or L10N (L10N is an abbreviation for the 10 letters between the l and n in localization) describes the process after I18N, of adapting an application to a specific locale. L10N might be best thought of as the process of "skinning" a locale-neutral I18N application into a specific locale.

• Finally, globalization or G11N (that's right, another abbreviation) is sometimes used as a synonym for I18N. But to me, it's the actual application implementation (L10N) across several locales after I18Nin other words, globalization is both I18N and L10N.

Now that we know what globalization really means, let's look at an overview of how we can accomplish it.

Dancing the Globalization Jig

How you go about globalizing your ColdFusion application depends on whether you have an existing code base. (And let me emphasize here that making an existing application I18N means you have a tough row to hoe.) The process entails these basic steps:

First you review your existing application components to identify obstacles to the I18N process. Application components include your ColdFusion code, the application's display tier (including Flash, HTML, JavaScript, and so on), ColdFusion tags, middleware, and your back-end database. An I18N obstacle is an area where the component needs either amending to make it I18N, or replacement by an I18N-capable version.

The next step is to amend or replace non-I18N application components. Wholesale replacement of existing components is by far the easiest thing to do. For instance, if your database doesn't support Unicode (the ins and outs of Unicode are discussed shortly), simply replace it with one that does. Amending existing components is another story. It's a task that's often described as "mind numbing," "brutal," "death by a thousand cuts," and "torturous," as well as a few choice adjectives that the editor wouldn't let me use here. We'll get into these devilish details later on in this chapter.

Next, you localize the application by providing translated text resources and display tier layouts, graphics, and so on.

Finally, you document the whole mess in the appropriate locale/language.

The bottom line: Considering the amount of work required to make an existing application I18N, it's a darned good idea to design/code your application from the ground-up for I18N. If you do that, all you need do is localize and document. Much simpler, isn't it?

Now that the background information's out of the way, we can get down to the real nitty-gritty of creating a G11N ColdFusion MX 7 application.