Chapter 13. Internationalization, localization, and accessibility
This chapter covers
- Making your user interface as widely usable as possible
- Handling pluralization and user-defined differences in messages
- Presenting times, dates, currencies, and numbers as users expect
In this chapter we’ll explore how to make your application as familiar to as many people as possible, through internationalization and localization. Using those techniques, you can present the interface in a user’s own language—with familiar date, time, and currency formats—and even display it in the expected direction (some users may read from right to left).
We’ll look at both of GWT’s provided approaches to internationalization (i18n)—static and dynamic—as well as how it supports localization (L10n). The static approach is preferred because it allows the compiler to remove unused information (making the download as small as possible, thereby improving user experience), whereas the dynamic approach is more useful when you have legacy data. Finally, we’ll quickly cover some tips on making your application more accessible—supporting visually impaired users.
If you have the chapter’s example application loaded into Eclipse, then it’s time to start looking at how to make the user interface as familiar to the user as you can.