10. Internationalization with gawk

Once upon a time, computer makers wrote software that only worked in English. Eventually, hardware and software vendors noticed that if their systems worked in the native languages of non-English-speaking countries, they were able to sell more systems. As a result, internationalization and localization of programs and software systems became a common practice.

Until recently, the ability to provide internationalization was largely restricted to programs written in C and C++. This chapter describes the underlying library gawk uses for internationalization, as well as how gawk makes internationalization features available at the awk program level. Having internationalization available at the awk level gives software developers additional flexibility--they are no longer required to write in C when internationalization is a requirement.

10.1 Internationalization and Localization
10.2 GNU gettext		How GNU gettext works.
10.3 Internationalizing awk Programs		Features for the programmer.
10.4 Translating awk Programs		Features for the translator.
10.5 A Simple Internationalization Example		A simple i18n example.
10.6 gawk Can Speak Your Language		gawk is also internationalized.