The Overall Process: Internationalization, Globalization and Localization
As the former Localization Industry Standards Association (LISA) explained, globalization "can best be thought of as a cycle rather than a single process." To globalize is to plan the design and development methods for a product in advance, keeping in mind a multicultural audience, in order to avoid increased costs and quality problems, save time, and smooth the localizing effort for each region or country. Localization is an integral part of the overall process called globalization.
There are two primary technical processes that comprise globalization, internationalization and localization.
The first phase, internationalization, encompasses the planning and preparation stages for a product that is built by design to support global markets. This process removes all cultural assumptions, and any country- or language-specific content is stored so that it can be easily adapted. If this content is not separated during this phase, it must be fixed during localization, adding time and expense to the project. In extreme cases, products that were not internationalized may not be localizable. Alternatively there is an emerging class of software which can localize an application without altering the underlying code in any way.
The second phase, localization, refers to the actual adaptation of the product for a specific market. The localization phase involves, among other things, the four issues LISA describes as linguistic, physical, business and cultural, and technical issues.
At the end of each phase, testing (including quality assurance) is performed to ensure that product works properly and meets the client's quality expectations.
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