Localization

Game Writing: Narrative Skills for Videogames (Charles River Media Game Development)

As computer games become more and more like Hollywood productions, the need for good story lines increases. Research shows that stories are highly valued by game players, so today's studios and developers need good writers. Creating narrative - a traditionally static form - for games is a major challenge. Games are at their heart dynamic, interactive systems, so they don't follow the guidelines and rules of film or T.V. writing. Game Writing: Narrative Skills for Videogames addresses these issues and is the first book written to demystify this emerging field. Through the insights and experiences of practicing game writers, the book captures a snapshot of the narrative skills employed in today's game industry. This unique collection of practical articles provides the foundations to the craft of game writing. The articles, written by member of the International Game Developer's (IDGA) Game Writer's SIG, detail aspects of the process from the basics of narrative and non-linear narrative to writing comedy for games and creating compelling characters. Throughout the articles there is a strong emphasis on the skills developers and publishers will expect a game writer to have. The book is suitable for both beginners and experienced writers, and is a detailed guide to all the techniques of game writing. This book is an essential read for anyone wishing to get into this exciting field, particularly for new game writers wanting to hone their skills, and film and T.V. scriptwriters who want to learn how to transfer their skills to the games industry.

Wicket in Action

There are dozens of Java frameworks out there, but most of them require you to learn special coding techniques and new, often rigid, patterns of development. Wicket is different. As a component-based Web application framework, Wicket lets you build maintainable enterprise-grade web applications using the power of plain old Java objects (POJOs), HTML, Ajax, Spring, Hibernate and Maven. Wicket automatically manages state at the component level, which means no more awkward HTTPSession objects. Its elegant programming model enables you to write rich web applications quickly.

Wicket in Action is an authoritative, comprehensive guide for Java developers building Wicket-based Web applications. This book starts with an introduction to Wicket's structure and components, and moves quickly into examples of Wicket at work. Written by two of the project's earliest and most authoritative experts, this book shows you both the "how-to" and the "why" of Wicket. As you move through the book, you'll learn to use and customize Wicket components, how to interact with other technologies like Spring and Hibernate, and how to build rich, Ajax-driven features into your applications.

The Culturally Customized Web Site: Customizing Web Sites for the Global Marketplace

In The Culturally Customized Web Site, Nitish Singh and Arun Pereira focus on cultural aspects of international website design, honing in on three objectives:
* First, to present a review and survey results on standardization/localization issues on the web
* Second, to present a scientifically tested framework to design culturally adapted international websites, and provide marketers and web designers with practical web localization tools
* Third, to show readers the power and effectiveness of culturally customized websites

This is the first book to address the issue of website standardization, localizationor what the authors refer to as cultural customization. Little evidence has been accumulated to show whether international consumers prefer to browse and buy from standardized global websites or websites adapted to local cultures. The Culturally Customized Web Site provides insights into whether the web is a culturally neutral medium of communication or a medium impregnated with cultural values. Also presented is empirical evidence as to whether local consumers prefer standardized websites or websites adapted to their culture.

Visit www.theculturallycustomizedwebsite.com

* The first book to offer a scientifically developed and validated theoretical framework to culturally customize web sites
* Offers practical guidelines to marketing professionals in the international marketplace and challenges the practice of a standardized approach to global e-marketing
* Provides illustrative examples of the power of culture in influencing web browsing and online buying behavior

A Practical Guide to Localization (Language International World Directory)

A Practical Guide to Localization was written for translators, localization engineers, testing engineers, desktop publishers, project managers, and anyone else who may be involved in the release of multilingual products. In this second edition, translators can learn more on localizing software, online help, and documentation files, and on the latest translation technology tools. Localization engineers will learn all about developing, engineering and testing software and online help projects. For project managers, there is all the information needed in planning translation or localization projects, finding resources, and ensuring the quality of deliverables. New to this second, fully updated and revised edition are chapters on internationalization, desktop publishing, and software quality assurance.

The book has been designed as both a reference work and a teaching tool.

Bert Esselink has been active in localization for over a decade. After graduating in technical translation and taking university classes in programming and computational linguistics, he worked for several years as software localizer, localization engineer, and technical project manager at International Software Products. In 1996 he joined ALPNET in Amsterdam as localization manager, before taking on the role of globalization manager, developing internal production quality standards. In January 2000 Bert joined Lionbridge to head up their globalization consulting services.

Internationalization and Localization Using Microsoft .NET

Written for the IT manager or developer planning to bring software to today's global markets, Internationalization and Localization Using Microsoft .NET provides a solid blueprint for success with the new and improved support for multilingual software available in .NET.

As a veteran of building software for multiple languages (with considerable experience with Visual Basic 6), author Nick Symmonds shares his insight about techniques that work best for internationalizing software. Early sections establish guiding principles on how to use "resource bundles" for all graphics and strings in your software. In an interesting early section, the author glances at the very different meanings of certain colors in Western and Eastern cultures, showing the dangers of making easy assumptions about how the visual elements of your software will travel.

Subsequent chapters look at how these string and graphics resources worked in the old Visual Basic 6. Here the author shows off a way to extend the support for multiple resource files in VB6. (Normally, VB6 supports only a single bundle.)

The text then zeros in on the new support for multilingual software in Microsoft's .NET platform, including default support for over a half-dozen calendars and tracking virtually all the world's languages (and dialects) with support for enumerating cultural regions. Most importantly, with .NET you can use XML-based resource files for storing culturally dependent strings and graphics separately. (Of course, based on this infrastructure, it's still up to you to translate your software into multiple languages.)

Techniques are illustrated here with two more substantial projects (in both VB .NET and C#). There's a useful custom resource editor and a hotel-booking application (with support for both English and German users). Final sections round out the discussion with the author's advice for localizing software and some hints for translating program text effectively across cultures, including advice for project management.

The .NET platform works with some 20 computer languages and is sure to be used on even more human languages as software is written for today's global markets. With good reference sections on the relevant .NET classes and APIs that will be needed to develop multilingual software, some effective sample code, and an expert's perspective on doing the job right, this appealingly concise volume will certainly fill a worthwhile niche. --Richard Dragan

Topics covered: Guidelines for internationalizing software (hints for choosing graphics and colors), overview of resource files, GUI design for multinational applications; introduction to Unicode, Visual Basic 6 resource files (including how to use multiple resource bundles), built-in .NET classes for localizing software (calendars, the CultureInfo class, region, and String classes), .NET reflection and threading for internationalization, tutorial to .NET XML-based resource files; resource editing in the Visual Studio .NET IDE, sample code for a custom resource editor with multilingual support, internationalizing GUIs, case study for a hotel-booking application, security issues with .NET resource files (plus .NET versioning, hints for project management, and outsourcing translation for multilingual software), considerations for installation utilities, and VB .NET and C# code examples.

Internationalization and Localization Using Microsoft .NET is intended to be a comprehensive discussion of how to localize code using Visual Studio .NET. Author Nick Symmonds knows the advantages of preparing for localization in the design stage and the disadvantages of localizing a project after the fact, and he discusses both methods of localizing code in this book. All aspects of localization are examined, from handling date, time, and currency and text data, to developing multilingual user interfaces and help files. He also covers Visual Studio's localization features and tools in depth and presents the pros and cons of each to the reader.

Internationalization and Localization Using Microsoft .NET is unique in that it covers both C# and VB .NETall examples are presented in both languages. This language-independent approach is essential given that large systems may use both languages, and the principals discussed can be applied to other .NET languages as well. Some of the core topics covered are as follows:

• The Globalization and Resources namespaces, which relate directly to localization
• Resource files and how they are used in .NET
• Visual and command-line tools that aid in localization
• In depth discussion of design and implementation of world-ready programs

Also included is a comprehensive example of a resource editor, with code provided in both C# and VB .NET. This project is not only useful as product in itself, but also instructive in how to write fairly complicated code in both .NET languages.

Internationalization and Localization Using Microsoft .NET is intended to be a comprehensive discussion of how to localize code using Visual Studio .NET. Author Nick Symmonds knows the advantages of preparing for localization in the design stage and the disadvantages of localizing a project after the fact, and he discusses both methods of localizing code in this book. All aspects of localization are examined, from handling date, time, and currency and text data to developing multilingual user interfaces and help files. He also covers Visual Studio's localization features and tools in depth and presents the pros and cons of each to the reader.

Internationalization and Localization Using Microsoft .NET is unique in that it covers both C# and VB .NET—all examples are presented in both languages. This language-independent approach is essential given that large systems may use both languages, and the principals discussed can be applied to other .NET languages as well. Some of the core topics covered are as follows:

• The Globalization and Resources namespaces, which relate directly to localization
• Resource files and how they are used in .NET
• Visual and command-line tools that aid in localization
• In depth discussion of design and implementation of world-ready programs

Also included is a comprehensive example of a resource editor, with code provided in both C# and VB .NET. This project is not only useful as product in itself, but it's also instructive in how to write fairly complicated code in both .NET languages.

Developing International Software, Second Edition

This comprehensive guide helps developers, testers and product designers write internationally-compliant, global code that is Microsoft Logo Certifiable for Windows 2000 and Windows XP. The handbook teaches users how to localize Windows-based applications more easily and less expensively, determine important culture-specific issues, avoid international information pitfalls and legal issues, and much more. It covers all of the essentials for developing international software-and it's delivered by the collective experience of the Windows International group.

XML Internationalization and Localization (Sams White Book)

The purpose of this book is twofold: First to describe what needs to be done to internationalize XML documents and applications; second to describe how the XML data can be localized efficiently.

There is currently almost no information on these two topics grouped and organized in a single reference. In addition, while XML has evolved a lot the past 2 years, it has now reached a point of global acceptance, as evidenced by the many international XML working groups addressing trading partner agreements, electronic document exchange, business processes, and eBusiness.

Developing International Software for Windows 95 and Windows Nt (Microsoft Programming Series)

FastSLAM: A Scalable Method for the Simultaneous Localization and Mapping Problem in Robotics (Springer Tracts in Advanced Robotics)

This monograph describes a new family of algorithms for the simultaneous localization and mapping problem in robotics (SLAM). SLAM addresses the problem of acquiring an environment map with a roving robot, while simultaneously localizing the robot relative to this map. This problem has received enormous attention in the robotics community in the past few years, reaching a peak of popularity on the occasion of the DARPA Grand Challenge in October 2005, which was won by the team headed by the authors. The FastSLAM family of algorithms applies particle filters to the SLAM Problem, which provides new insights into the data association problem that is paramount in SLAM. The FastSLAM-type algorithms have enabled robots to acquire maps of unprecedented size and accuracy, in a number of robot application domains and have been successfully applied in different dynamic environments, including the solution to the problem of people tracking.

Global Software Development Handbook (Auerbach Series on Applied Software Engineering Series)

Economics and technology have dramatically re-shaped the landscape of software development. It is no longer uncommon to find a software development team dispersed across countries or continents. Geographically distributed development challenges the ability to clearly communicate, enforce standards, ensure quality levels, and coordinate tasks. Global Software Development Handbook explores techniques that can bridge distances, create cohesion, promote quality, and strengthen lines of communication. The book introduces techniques proven successful at international electronics and software giant Siemens AG. It shows how this multinational uses a high-level process framework that balances agility and discipline for globally distributed software development. The authors delineate an organizational structure that not only fosters team building, but also achieves effective collaboration among the central and satellite teams. The handbook explores the issues surrounding quality and the processes required to realize quality in a distributed environment. Communication is a tremendous challenge, especially for teams separated by several time zones, and the authors elucidate how to uncover patterns of communication among these teams to determine effective strategies for managing communication. The authors analyze successful and failed projects and apply this information to how a project can be successful with distributed teams. They also provide lightweight processes that can be dynamically adapted to the demands of any project.