A great way to make your website more accessible to international users, is to use Google Translation Tools.
You can get them here:-
http://translate.google.com/translate_tools
Although many CMS based systems, including Joomla (my preferred Content Management System) are multi-lingual and can support multiple languages, the barrier to many organisations, especially smaller companies is the cost of translating their website content to multiple languages.
Whilst I profess that Google isn’t a perfect translator by any stretch, it is much better than nothing.
If you want to see what a website looks like with Google Translation Tools integrated, pop over to www.zimt.co.uk and just select a language other than English from the dropdown menu.
Google has announced that it is to develop an Operating System. I think this is a very clever move, and although it will cost them a big chunk of money, they do have the resources and marketing ability to make it succeed. if it does work it starts to give them real control of some areas of the “PC” sector.
Initially, the Linux distros will be the biggest losers, and although they have their fans, Linux penetration does seem to have not gone any further on PC based systems (i.e. desktops/laptops etc.) than technically savvy users and netbook users. The server space is obviously a whole different ball game.
Microsoft will continue to push Windows 7, and due to its architecture will have a credible offering in the netbook space also. What do you bet that it wont be free though! Google continues to impinge on Microsofts space, and continues to innovate. Don’t write Microsoft off just yet though!
If Google can offer a reliable, easy to use and malware/virus free user experience I think it will be onto a winner. It will be interesting to see how things shape out.
