Getting Started with Internationalization
Resources for content authors who are new to Web internationalization, to help them get started with the topic.
For a general introduction to internationalization and an overview of the work of the W3C Internationalization Activity, see:
Basic concepts & definitions
The following articles of general interest define key terminology.
Localization vs. Internationalization
What do the terms 'internationalization' and 'localization' mean, and how are they related?International & multilingual Web sites
What is an 'international' or a 'multilingual' web site?- Monolingual vs. multilingual Web sites
What are the trade-offs between international sites that are monolingual vs. multilingual? Character encodings: Essential concepts
A number of basic concepts needed to understand other articles that deal with characters and character encodings.-
Unicode Bidirectional Algorithm basics
What does the Unicode Bidirectional (bidi) Algorithm do, basically? Time & date: Essential concepts
A number of basic concepts needed to understand other articles that deal with time zones and other aspects of working with dates and times.
Introductory articles
Gentle introductions to various internationalization topics.
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Internationalization Quick Tips.
Reminders of some key things to keep in mind when developing Web content. -
Character sets and encodings.
How to choose and work with character encodings and escapes, and other topics related to characters. -
Language on the Web.
Declaring the human language of your content, and related topics, such as language-based styling, content negotiation, and user navigation. -
Personal names around the world.
How do people's names differ around the world, and what are the implications of those differences on the design of forms, databases, ontologies, etc. for the Web?
Tutorials
Pages that point to other articles, to take you to the next level of understanding.
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Handling character encodings in HTML and CSS
Understand the essentials of authoring HTML and CSS related to characters and character encodings. -
Working with language in HTML
Understand the essentials of working with language information when authoring HTML and CSS. -
Creating HTML Pages in Arabic, Hebrew and Other Right-to-left Scripts
Understand the essentials of working with languages in right-to-left scripts and bidirectional text when authoring HTML and CSS.
Taking it further
To further develop your knowledge and encounter other topics we recommend the following.
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Internationalization techniques: Authoring web pages
Resources on the W3C Internationalization Activity site and elsewhere that help you author HTML and CSS for internationalization. -
Articles & tutorials
A list of all the articles available. This page also allows you to see which pages have been translated into another language.