5 Localization

The CDC Java runtime environment can be localized to support different languages and cultures. The following sections provide CDC-specific information for localization procedures:

Setting Locale System Properties
Timezone Information Files
Font Management (Personal Basis Profile only)

5.1 Setting Locale System Properties

In the CDC Java runtime environment, the locale system properties described in Table 5-1 are set before cvm can parse its command-line arguments. Thus, it is not possible to change the locale by specifying these system properties on the cvm command-line with the -Dproperty=value option.

Table 5-1 Locale System Properties

System Property	Description
user.language	Two-letter language name code based on ISO 639.
user.region	Two-letter region name code based on ISO 3166.
file.encoding	Default character-encoding name based on the IANA Charset MIB.

On Linux, these properties are extracted from the LANG locale environment variable using the format language_region.encoding. The user.language property is obtained from the language code. The user.region property is obtained from the region code. The file.encoding property is obtained from the encoding suffix. For example, to change the locale behavior of cvm on Linux, simply change the LANG locale environment variable to set the locale system properties.

% setenv LANG en_US.ISO8859_1

Therefore,

user.language = en
user.region = US
file.encoding = ISO8859_1

5.2 Timezone Information Files

The lib/zi directory contains a small set of example timezone information files. Additional files can be generated and placed in this directory. See the javadoc comments for the sun.util.calendar.ZoneInfoFile class for information about generating alternate timezone information files.

5.3 Font Management (Personal Basis Profile only)

In the CDC Java runtime environment, font management is a subset of the functionality provided by Java SE technology and is described below in Table 5-2.

Table 5-2 Font Management Comparison

Feature	Java SE	CDC
Default font mapping between Java logical fonts and platform logical fonts is specified at build-time.	yes	yes
Logical font mapping in `lib/font.properties` file.	yes	no
Bundled Lucida fonts in `lib/fonts`.	yes	no
Application-specific fonts in an application's `jar` file.	yes	no

The six logical fonts available to a Java application are described in Table 5-3.

In practice, the only way to specify alternate fonts is to remap the platform logical fonts. TrueType fonts are mapped to logical platform fonts used by the CDC Java runtime environment for the Java logical fonts described in Table 5-3.

Table 5-3 Logical Font Names

Java Logical Font	Qt Logical Font	Example	Description
default	Sans Serif	Courier	The default font is used when no other font is specified or if an attempt to match a font fails.
dialog	Sans Serif	Lucida Sans	A font for displaying fixed information within a dialog box or form.
dialoginput	Courier	Lucida Sans Typewriter	A font that is used for text fields within dialog boxes and forms that represent user input.
monospaced	Courier	Lucida Sans Typewriter	A non-proportional font where each character has the same width. This simplifies string width calculations for dialog boxes and forms.
sanserif	Sans Serif	Helvetica	A streamlined font that is simpler to render on low-resolution devices like computer monitors and faxes.
serif	Serif	Times Roman	A font with short lines at the end of the main strokes of a character to ease visual character recognition.