Will you localize the app to my language?
I often receive requests to localize my apps to some other languages. There are several reasons why I avoid this:
- I update my apps quite frequently - every string update would require the update of all the localised languages which would slow-down the release process considerably. When some user offers to translate the app, he/she usually means translating the current version. However, what I would need is a continuous translation support for every future release. And nobody can promise he'll have time to translate the update of the app in 3 years in the second week of July.
- To mitigate the problems from the above point, I could use some professional app translating service with guaranteed availability. The problem with these companies is that they employ translators who aren't IT experts and I'm worried that because the app is full of very technical terms, the result will be awful. And not knowing the language, I wouldn't be able to verify the quality of the translation.
- The layout of the user interface is optimized for certain string sizes. Each translation would be of a different length so some texts could start to overflow in the user interface or be truncated.
- I'm Czech so English isn't my native language. But I always prefer the English terminology when IT is involved. My operating system language is set to English and all applications are in English. The English terminology is the most established one and often I'm quite confused when I read Czech translations of some terms. And frankly, if you don't understand the words like "server", "network", "gateway", "IP", "DNS", "download", "upload", "history", "Start", "Stop", etc., the app isn't for you.