International Solution Concepts

The Internet is a global marketplace. This means that your e-commerce business is international even if you have no intention of conducting business internationally. In order to make your Commerce Server 2002 Web site global, you must determine how to present your business to international users.

When users browse your site, the characters they enter in their browser are determined by the regional options they have set on their computer. These settings control the characters recorded by keyboard entries, as well as the representation of special symbols such as currency and decimal delimiters. For example, typing the ; key on a computer with an English keyboard with the input locale set to English (United States) will result in a semicolon. On the same computer with an English keyboard if you change the input locale setting to Spanish (Mexico), typing the ; key results in an ñ (eña).

Planning for your international users requires development of a system for reconciling the various locale settings. You need a way to present data and accept input using the locale settings that are appropriate to the user. In Commerce Server 2002, the Product Catalog System is designed to support multiple languages in a single catalog. For additional information about development techniques for international solutions, see Developing an International Site.

The process of internationalizing a site is described in this section through a fictional scenario. Although this scenario illustrates many of the principles for developing an international solution, it is by no means the only possible approach to international solution development.

This section contains:

• Feature Summary for International Solutions. Describes the feature summary of developing an international solution.
• Development, Administrative, and Management Tasks for International Solutions. Describes a summary of tasks that you may need to complete to create your international solution.
• International Scenario Summary. Describes a fictional business scenario summary to create a single site for all international users.
• International Transactions. Describes a fictional business scenario of how two types of currency conversion can be applied to support transactions that involve two or more currencies.
• International Catalogs. Describes a fictional business scenario of how you can apply multilingual and multicurrency features to deliver the appropriate catalog content.
• International Campaigns. Describes a fictional business scenario of how two areas of the Commerce Server Targeting System can be applied to display culturally appropriate campaign information.
• International Shipping. Describes a fictional business scenario of how delivering shipping information in a particular locale can be implemented.

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