The Importance of Foreign Languages in the IT Sector

chillibreeze writer — Anuprita Deshpande

It all started when I scored good marks in my German paper at the Boards. Matter of fact I missed my Board prize by just two marks. I loved languages, but never thought I would want to pursue one as a career. It was all thanks to my mother who encouraged me to join the Max Mueller Bhavan, an International German Institute for further studies. It proved to be a turning point in my life.

The next turning point came when I was working as a German translator for an Indo-German firm back in India. The whole software (Interface) was in German and I was translating some help files related to it when my boss passed by. Something snapped in his mind and he came to me and said, ' Why don't you help in testing some screens, which the developers have freshly made and they are all in German'. I wasn't sure what he meant but the try was worth it. I not only tested the screens but came across a lot of bugs, to the dismay of the developers, which further defined my role as a Software tester/QA.

Recent information technology developments can be best described by Internationalization, localization and globalization.

What's Localization?

The computer lingo consists of digital zeroes and ones. In fact, all programming languages, all operating systems, and most applications are written in English, thereby making it easy for the world's English speaking countries to relate and understand.

Well, but what about those do not speak English? That is where Localization comes in! Localization means changing software written in one language for members of one culture to another language for members of another culture. One would think, its simply translation, so what's the big deal? But in fact, it involves not only translation of individual words, but modifying programming code involving character sets, box sizes, dates, dictionary search patterns, icons, data files etc. Localization goes through various stages: initial translation, followed by "reverse-translation" into the original language, comparing of the reverse text with the original and finally making sense out of the whole text in the localized language.

Translation/Localization sure is a lucrative profession as the cost per word translated is approximately one dollar. Just imagine when corporate giants need to localize huge data!

Localization: How it helps business?

In Geneva meetings of localizers take place every year. They also publish a newsletter. Every major software company has its localization division either in the same country or in some other part of the world. A large part of Microsoft sales is outside the United States, thus its localization partner is highly diverse and not geographically concentrated.

Major software producers sub-contract their localization and testing to smaller firms thereby reducing their expenses.

Localization is gaining popularity only in the recent years. It still needs awareness on a global front and individuals and governments are aware of this problem. An Indian high school student in Delhi has a perfect knowledge of Hindi, but less perfect knowledge of English thereby hindering his access to operating systems in English. How wonderful it would be to localize Windows in Hindi?

France stands out from the rest of the nations in this respect as it is keenly trying and insisting on localization.

No one can beat South Asia in its linguistic groups: for example, Hindi is spoken by 400 million people, Bengali by 200 million, and languages like Telegu with 80 million, that's about the size of Germany's entire population! India boasts of 18 official languages. Most of these languages have their own script and also cognates.

Asia's diverse range of languages makes localization all the more important. And then shouldn't everyone benefit from the ever-spiraling Information technology?

Localization is just a click away….

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Anuprita writes for chillibreeze.

The Importance of Foreign Languages in the IT Sector

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