We make b2b2c ecommerce applications and frameworks. We are currently internationalizing all our current CRM, SCM, etc applications to enable them to run in any locale. Converting all to Unicode is the smaller task, as we found out. To maintain compatibility to legacy char sets and code pages you need to update using both ways, a big hassle. Chances of running into Unicode encodings that do not have a legacy encoding is slim.
The bigger challenges are database improvements to handle multiple concurrent languages and to have them sorted per locale. Each piece of data that gets transfered contains info about its locale, especially important when you have to handle multiple currencies at once (like with multiple supplier quotes from different countries). Not even to mention when and how the exchange rates get updated. Oh, and when does an offer expire, in the client timezone or in the server timezone?
We have to support multiple platforms - MS NT & Win2000, Solaris, AIX, HP-UX, Oracle, DB2, IE 5x, Netscape...... oh, and the 3rd party SW nightmares for webservers.... and Java is different everywhere too. C++ also has it's issues, we are moving to ICU for Java and C++, since Java doesn't cut it for internationalization.
Converting all to Unicode and maintaining compatibility with legacy installations was the easiest task of them all.
Dave
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We make b2b2c ecommerce applications and frameworks. We are currently internationalizing all our current CRM, SCM, etc applications to enable them to run in any locale. Converting all to Unicode is the smaller task, as we found out. To maintain compatibility to legacy char sets and code pages you need to update using both ways, a big hassle. Chances of running into Unicode encodings that do not have a legacy encoding is slim. ...... oh, and the 3rd party SW nightmares for webservers .... and Java is different everywhere too. C++ also has it's issues, we are moving to ICU for Java and C++, since Java doesn't cut it for internationalization.
The bigger challenges are database improvements to handle multiple concurrent languages and to have them sorted per locale. Each piece of data that gets transfered contains info about its locale, especially important when you have to handle multiple currencies at once (like with multiple supplier quotes from different countries). Not even to mention when and how the exchange rates get updated. Oh, and when does an offer expire, in the client timezone or in the server timezone?
We have to support multiple platforms - MS NT & Win2000, Solaris, AIX, HP-UX, Oracle, DB2, IE 5x, Netscape
Converting all to Unicode and maintaining compatibility with legacy installations was the easiest task of them all.
Dave