Localization ground rules

Question

I've just submitted my first localized app to the iPhone app store the other day. I decided to do it to learn about application localization, and because my app was simple enough to stumble through localizing with my mediocre french. I know I didn't do everything "right", but I learned a lot from doing it once. I'd like to keep doing this for all my future apps.

For one thing, I learned to code with localization in mind, but don't start localizing until your app is ready to be released. I spent way too much time doing small tweaks in 2 UI files.

What are your favourite localization basics, cardinal rules, and best practices? I'm thinking mostly for small hobby developers like myself, although stuff from the big leagues would be interesting as well.

Answer 1

The biggest one for me is don't concatenate strings:

Bad:

"You have " + messageCount + " messages";

Good:

"You have {0} messages"

Word order varies from language to language, and so you can't assume where in a sentence your dynamic data might occur.