Re: [I18nrp] charter -01

["Hollenbeck, Scott" <[e-mail]>]

From: Jiankang Yao <[e-mail]>
Sent: Wednesday, August 15, 2018 9:44 PM
To: Hollenbeck, Scott <[e-mail]>om>; i18nrp <[e-mail]>
Subject: [EXTERNAL] Re: Re: [I18nrp] charter -01







From: Hollenbeck, Scott<mailto:shollenbeck=[e-mail]>

Date: 2018-08-15 22:42

To: '[e-mail]'<mailto:[e-mail]>

Subject: Re: [I18nrp] charter -01





>> Internationalization Directorate (i18ndir) Charter

>

>"Internationalization" sometimes drifts into areas that I would describe as "localization". That is, use in some local-only context. Does anyone else see this distinction,

>



Thanks for pointing it out.

Actually, I share some similar ideas with you when I did some research in idn, eai and Internationalization many years ago.



I am a Chinese speaker. If we talk about Internationalization in general in our culture, not in IETF scope, Internationalization means to use English/latin character to reach outside China, localization is to mean how to use Chinese Character to adapt to the local needs.



For Non-English speaker, Internationalization is to reach the English speaker, localization is to reach the local people of non-English.

For English speaker, Internationalization is to reach the non-English speaker, localization is to reach the local people of English.

So I am sure that the wording "Internationalization " in IETF is invented by some native English IETF expert.





Back to the wording of Internationalization in IETF, my understanding is that Internationalization is how to use Unicode which includes almost all local characters; localization is how to use the local encoding such as GB2312.



Yes, Internationalization  sometimes includes  some local-only context. For an example, in IDN, we sometimes need to consider Chinese character (simplified one, tradtional one), Arabic character(right to left); these characters may need to have some special rules to deal to be adapt to the local needs.







>

> and if so, is it something to be concerned about?

>



We need to refine the definition of Internationalization and loccalization in IETF.



[SAH] Thanks for everyone's feedback. I'd like to suggest that one thing we can do with the charter to make the distinction clearer is to cite the definition of internationalization from Section 2 of RFC 6365:



OLD TEXT
The Internationalization Directorate is a specialized advisory group that assists the Area Directors of the Applications and Real-Time Area with regard to internationalization, in accordance with RFC 2418.



NEW TEXT
The Internationalization Directorate is a specialized advisory group that assists the Area Directors of the Applications and Real-Time Area with regard to internationalization (as defined in Section 2 of RFC 6365), in accordance with RFC 2418.


Scott