Research On User Interface Translation

As of now, the first ten years of the21st century have passed, and we’ll find that theglobalization process has covered every corner of the world with the rapid developmentof Internet. The “Global Village” described by Marshall McLuhan is coming into being.And the terms “Localization” and “Globalization” are mentioned unprecedentedly morenow. There is enormous demand of globalization, internationalization and localizationin the domain of politics, public affairs, business as well as culture, because companies,organizations or even governments need their “products” to be internationally available(internationalized) and globally applicable (globalized) in order to be recognizedand accepted in different cultural areas (localized). The demand is closely related totranslational activities. Translation services along these lines have become the mainstreamglobally, and they are generally called GILT industry (Globalization, Internationalization,Localization and Translation Industry).However, not much has been done to learn about GILT industry from the perspectiveof translation studies globally, and even less has been done in China, which indicatesthat for a long time GILT industry does not take translation too seriously and meanwhiletranslation researchers don’t care about GILT industry. In this paper, the localization ofUser Interface, an important part of software localization, is dissected and analyzed witha translational perspective. The translation issues during the process of User Interfacelocalization are discussed in the framework of German functionalist translation theory;besides, some related theories of Usability Engineering and UI Design are employedto help conduct this multi-facet and multi-level research. In summary, functionalisttranslation theory, as the framework and macro viewpoint, and Usability Engineeringand UI Design theories, as the supporting element and micro viewpoint, are combinedto work. The author tries to summarize the principles, tricks, obstacles and pitfalls ofUser Interface localization, which hopefully can provide the practice of this domain someconstructive advice and contribute to the translation studies about GILT industry.