As the Internet spreads across the globe it is becoming increasingly important for web sites and online documents to be designed and developed with foreign languages in mind.  Translation of content and graphics along with their placement on a page are crucial issues if you want the page you are developing to be truly international.  Hosting issues may be different in other nations as well and the internationalisation of your website really has to be thought about from the start of the development process if you are interested in having a truly global presence.

This entire procedure regarding the international publishing of a web page is known as web site globalisation.  There are many different steps to this process that must be adhered to if your internet presence is going to be truly global in its scope.  Firstly you need to choose your tools carefully, you are going to need a server and software that is going to support your international needs.  The design of your page will need to be optimised with localisation in mind as well, what parts of your site are going to need to be translated and what parts are going to act as global content?  The databases you use then need to be developed to include the navigation systems and content management necessary for a multilingual tool set.  While Unicode is great it leaves the specifics of the visual language set up to the individual software, and you need a database that can handle these procedures.

You will need to decide on the type of folder structure your site will need, either a multilingual folder structure with folders for every language or maybe even a separate website for each language.  The latter solution is probably only viable if you are a fairly big organisation determined to have a permanent internet presence in multiple countries.  The database that you use will have to be versatile and support multiple languages, and other issues like different currencies and calender formats will also have to be addressed.  Basically all of these issues will require for you to have a very object oriented approach to development and design.  The code and the content of your website will need to be clearly defined so that you can change one aspect like a specific language without having to re-design or re-program the entire page. 

After you have dealt with these initial considerations, you will need to find an appropriate localisation vendor who may either translate your existing content or provide content of their own that is specific to the culture that you need.  If your have a database with support for Unicode and multi-byte character sets than it will be possible to have your page translated and adapted for almost anywhere in the world.  Web site globalisation is a procedure taking place more and more often, especially by big business that is wanting to go global.  As international markets open and costs go down, your small business too can start to have a really international flavour.