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Posted by Jerry Stuckle on 02/27/06 02:40
Jan wrote:
> We'd like our web site to switch language depending on the country of
> the IP, or alternatively the language of the user's system if an IP
> check makes the server too slow. We'll have up to 600 new visits per
> minute at our site.
>
> Basics
> 1. Load DE.htm page by default
> 2. Switch to EN.htm or FR.htm for certain IP countries
> 3. Store value in cookie to avoid IP lookup for next visit, prefer P3P
> compliant
> 4. Let user pick language at any time in our menu, updating the cookie
>
> Free country database is available at:
> http://www.maxmind.com/app/geoip_country
>
> Ryanair.com is a site that appears to use a similar approach.
>
> If interested, we also have other web related tasks as well as SQL
> related ones. Maybe this is not the right forum to ask for assistence,
> any pointers to a good place?
>
Yep, don't bother.
First of all IP databases by country are not real reliable. They show
only where the server is, not where your user is.
But more importantly, the country may not reflect the desired language
of the user. For instance, what about Canada? Quebec, for instance,
has two official languages - French and English.
And what happens if I (an American) happen to be living in Germany,
Italy or other foreign country? There are a lot of people in that
position. Even worse, borders are pretty transparent in the EU.
Rather, have a default language, and allow the user to select the
language. One easy way is to use display country flags for the
selection. Most people know their country's flag.
This is how Ryanair.com does it. I just accessed their site via proxies
in Germany and France and came up with an English website both time.
--
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Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
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