This month we are giving the interview of Mrs. Sakina Bedi, Project Director at the Jagriti School for blind girls and Spokesperson for The National Federation of Blind. The interview is extensive enough to explain the problems faced by our differently able brethren. Particularly the last paragraph is really touching and inspiring both. At Modular, we are putting in our best possible efforts and coming out with various products for the visually challenged. These products include software like Shree-Lipi Braille, Optical Braille Reader, Braille-and-Print book printing software and devices like Braille-Mitra, Scan and Speak device. This is reflected in Modular Infotech Braille Group's Mission statement - “To enable the blind / visually handicapped persons to get access in Braille to the wealth of books in all Indian Languages (and English) in a short time.”

As Mrs. Bedi has pointed out, only 0.5 to 1% of the printed literature is currently available in the Braille format. We have been constantly making a request to all our author and publisher friends to allow maximum literature to be converted to Braille. Many renowned personalities like Dr. Prakash Amte and Dr. Jayant Naralikar have offered their books for conversion to Braille. We once again request all the authors and publishers to come forward and give permission for their maximum literature to be converted to Braille format. At Modular, we volunteer to do the conversions if the material is available to us in digital text format. So far we have converted over 100 books in different fields to Braille and we make them available at no cost (in soft form) to visually impaired individuals and Institutions working for the visually impaired. The visually impaired people yearn to get reading material in Braille in different subjects from different walks of life, to broaden their knowledge horizon, and learn the good things in life, but unfortunately very few books are available in Braille as of now. Let us take forward this mission, and help ourselves in getting the satisfaction of being able to help somebody.

Mrs. M. R. Joshi (Technical Director, MITPL)

This News letter is very nice. Layout using font and symbols is also good. specially I like Feed Back Facility.
Trupti, Pune.

I have Shri-Lipi 7.1 in win XP (32 Bit). Recently I upgraded windows 8 (32 Bit) and used Shree-Lipi on it. I found no error on it. Now I have updated Corel Draw X6 (64 Bit). for this I have to re-install windows 8 with 64 bit function. Can I use my existing Shree-Lipi in win 8 (64 bit) or I have to upgrade it from 32 bit to 64 bit. Thanks !
Mukesh Bafna, Bhayandar (West), Thane - 401101
(Dear Mr. Bafna please find reply from our support department as follows.)

I am your customer since 1999. But first time today I received your mail. It was very useful regarding the Tips & Tricks you post in the mail. Wish you all the best !
Yogesh Shah, Sangli - 416416
(Dear Mr. Shah please add modularforum@modular-infotech.com in your contact list to avoid our newsletter going into spam folder)

Download आणि installation आणि श्री लिपी कशी वापर करावी यासंबंधी मराठीतून पुस्तक तयार केले तर सर्व लोकांना याचा चांगलाच फायदा होईल अस माझ मत आहे कृपया त्वरित कळवा मी स्वत ७०००/रु चे सोफ्टवेर घेतले आहे पण कधी फोर्मेट केल्यावर खूप त्रास होतो कुणाला download,installation,use करता येत नाही
Mr. Narayan Marathe, Dhule - 424311

I appreciate your efforts in providing such a good service which I experianced in translation of our Instruction Manuals in Gujrathi& Malyalam.Regards Madhukar
Madhukar Gokhale, Pune - 411030

A FEW WORDS ON LOCALIZATION – SOME WE MIGHT KNOW, SOME WE MIGHT NOT.

Have we ever asked ourselves a simple question – What do Google, McDonald's and Harry Potter have in common? The answer is even simpler than the question – these magic words are known by most of us. But if we try to find out the answer with a broader approach we will see that, all these brand names have an impact on the global market not only significantly but also effectively. Behind their global success there are many factors such as – product quality, marketing, product acceptability, service, customer relation and many more; but one more common significant factor these multinational business houses also share – a term called Localization. Localization has made it possible for them to extend their business beyond the border of their actual origin and to engrave their prominent presence throughout the map of our global village. In this context a brief introduction to the terms like Localization, Internationalization, and Globalization is eventually necessary and we will also see why and how these concepts have inevitably changed the way of doing many conventional businesses.

LOCALIZATION – THE ‘WHAT’ FACTOR – A DEFINED CONCEPT

As we know, for a conceptual term, if the underlying concept is not very simple in nature or has not been practiced generally, then it might lead us to many misconceptions or sometimes it might become difficult to define it also. A similar scenario is observed in case of Localization also. Unfortunately, till now some of us do not exactly know what Localization is all about, or in many cases even people engaged or related to software industry often consider that it is somewhat synonymous to the term Translation.

Let us find out a conventional definition which will not only define the underlying concept of Localization but will also help us to understand what localization is.

In simple words, Localization – often shortened as L10N – is the process of adapting a product or service to a particular language, culture, and locale. This systematic process combines translations and cultural adaptations of products and services to make them suitable and understandable to a specific culture, location and market niche and more importantly it provides the local ‘Look & feel’ which is desired by the end-user of that particular locale.

On the other hand, Translation is one of the several services that contribute to the localization process. So in addition to translation, there are many serious steps or responsibilities that come under the localization process, which might include adapting graphical content to the target markets, modifying content layout to fit the translated content, converting to local currencies, using locale specific formats for dates, addresses, and phone numbers, addressing local regulations and many more.

Internationalization – often shortened as I18N – is the process of designing a product to accommodate multiple languages and markets, so that it can be adapted to desired languages and regions without any engineering changes to the product. This preparatory process of priming the product can save considerable time and effort at the time of localization of the product to make it reachable to the global market. So in simple words the basic goal of Internationalization is to make the product localizable.

Globalization – often shortened as G11N – is the cumulative work of translating and integrating all business functions – from processes to products and communications – to make a company ready for the global marketplace. Hence, Internationalization, Localization and all other related processes come under Globalization.

Note: The terms Globalization, Localization, Internationalization are frequently abbreviated to the numeronyms as G11N, L10N and I18N respectively, where the middle number, for example, 10 in case of L10N stands for the number of letters between the first and last letter of Localization i.e. L and N respectively.

LOCALIZATION – THE ‘HOW’ FACTOR – GO GLOBAL BY GOING LOCAL

The above definitions may be useful to understand the concept of localization but it is still a theoretical approach and sometimes boring and exhaustive. So let us find out a more practical approach by considering interesting example related to business approaches - practiced by some global business houses and how they are taking advantages of localization.

In order to understand how localization works, let us take the example of the McDonald's Corporation - the leading global foodservice retailer with more than 32,000 local restaurants serving more than 58 million people in around 130 countries each day. McDonald's presence in the global market is so prominent that it has become emblematic of globalization, sometimes referred to as the ‘McDonaldization’ of society. Now to achieve this status in international business arena, apart from delivering world class burger and service, McDonald's has implemented the basic concept of localization very effectively. Let us see how. McDonald's has found that, changes to their menus are a great way to globalize their brand without losing their identity. In order to make it possible, in Netherlands they will serve you Fritessaus instead of mayonnaise, in Canada you’ll be given locally-inspired Poutine instead of fries and in India our taste buds might become more sensitive when we look into the menu card and order something like McAlooTikki, Masala Grill Veg/Chicken or Chicken Maharaja Mac.

This is what localization is all about – Go Global By Going Local. We can now understand how it impacts the local consumer who is the ultimate key of the global market. Also considering the above McDonald's case we will try to clarify the differences in the terminologies like Localization, Translation and Transliteration. Let us take McAlooTikki as an example – in the English menu the company has not even translated the term in Indian language script, but the item name is very much localized and successfully presented in front of the Indian customers.

In this case instead of translation, a different approach of localization is used that is generally known as Transliteration. By definition, Transliteration is the conversion of a text from one script to another. McAloo Tikki is nothing but the transliterated form of the translated version of McPotato Roast. But any Indian food lover will agree on the fact that, the localized McAloo Tikki is far tastier than McPotato Roast, whereas the funny thing is that they are literally same.

LOCALIZATION – THE ‘WHY’ FACTOR – CAN’T READ, WON’T BUY

Now let us talk about why Localization should be a priority if we decide to grow our business beyond the barrier of some geographical border and to reach the global consumer with our products or services of any kind.

Over the past few decades, reports on surveys conducted by many leading market research groups have indicated a critical tendency of the global consumers, i.e. “Can’t Read, Won’t Buy”. Out of total surveyed consumers from all over the world, more than 70 percent of them said that they are more likely to buy products or services with information written in their native language. Hence it has become imperative that Localization makes products and services more accessible on a global front.

From our ancient civilization, language remains a barrier to the world functioning as a global village and economy. If effectively implemented, the localization approach can break this barrier to a maximum extent; at least it has become a truth for many business organizations over the past many decades.

ARE WE READY FOR THIS GLOBAL CHALLENGE?

Let us consider some facts revealed through the reports of some global surveys conducted on diversified groups of consumers from all over the world, that effectively illustrate the need to localize content for each target market:

• It would take 83 languages to reach 80 percent of all the people in the world, and over 7,000 languages to reach everyone.
• 56.2 percent of consumers say that the ability to obtain information in their own language is more important than the price.
• 74 percent of multinational enterprises believe it is either important or most important to achieve increased revenues from global operations.
• 95 percent of Chinese online consumers indicate greater comfort level with websites in their language

Now let us see some facts that are counter effects of the above facts:

• News, political statements, websites, movies, product literature, software, safety information, labeling, digital games and customer support are all translated every day in over 500 major language pairs worldwide.
• The worldwide language services market is growing at an annual rate of 7.4% and estimates for 2014 put the world market at some $39 billion

LOCALIZATION INDUSTRY AND GLOBAL BUSINESS

As a key component of Localization process, much work goes into translations. Words are translated into different languages; those words are tested for cultural relevance and understanding. Colors, images and symbols must be culturally appropriate. All these aspects are covered and undertaken by specialists from the localization and language industry.

It is the localization and language industry that helps organizations reach their target customers in the right language and cultural context. When you consider that less than 27% of the Internet is now in English, you can see why localization and language services are so important to companies worldwide.

The Localization industry consists of many different types of entities providing both outsourced language technology and services and in-house support within multinational companies. The industry is composed of:

• Technology Developers
  Technology companies are a key element of the localization and language industry. Innovative companies are creating solutions to make localization a reality.
• In-house Localization & Translation Departments
  Some multi-national companies have their own in-house teams that internally coordinate Localization & Translation strategy and implementation.
• Localization Service Providers (LSPs) & Translation Companies
  Most of the multi-national companies work with outsourced localization service providers, to localize their products and services.
• Translators & Interpreters
  Individual translators and interpreters are the core of the localization and language sector, often working as independent contractors and freelancers or as full-time staff.

LOCALIZATION AND MODULAR INFOTECH

As a pioneer in the field of Indian language based software product development – Modular InfoTech Pvt. Ltd. has massively contributed in all the above fields of localization industry. Apart from being a Localization Technology Developer for almost last three decades, in 2003 Modular InfoTech started providing Localization & translation Service to its Indian as well as foreign clients. This new journey was started with the prestigious project of complete localization of Microsoft Windows XP and Office 2003 in 5 major Indian languages, directly awarded by Microsoft Corporation, USA. It’s been a complete decade; Modular InfoTech is continuing to provide its quality service in the field of Localization & translation to its renowned American, European, Asian and Indian clients. Presently based on our clients’ requirement we are providing language service in 13 major Indian languages – Assamese, Bengali, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Konkani, Malayalam, Marathi, Odiya, Punjabi, Tamil, Telugu, and Urdu.

LANGUAGE TRANSLATORS – THE VITAL ASSETS OF LOCALIZATION SERVICE

With the massive evolution of software technology, Localization & translation Service is also experiencing substantial technology advancement and it is helping this IT Enabled Service to manage and implement its processes in order to provide business solution more and more effectively. Though these modern language services are managed by computer and internet, it is obvious that, they also require human intervention. As mentioned earlier also, in order to provide reliable Localization & translation service we require many good, hardworking, committed translators. Being the vital resource of Localization industry we consider our translators as our assets, but at the same time this job brings great responsibility for them also. It is indeed a serious, committed and interesting profession if we consider and accept it in that way.

The following three vital qualities or abilities are required for the translators, regardless whether they have any relevant experience or they are completely freshers:

1. Very good understanding in his/her mother tongue to clearly express the idea in that language

2. Good understanding of English to understand the source content that needs to be translated

3. Knowledge of computer operations, essentially Microsoft Windows, MS Office and Internet

With these qualities, you can always look forward to this as your profession. This profession can offer you much flexibility in your job profile. The best parts are:

• Anyone having the above abilities can do the translation work
• Resources from any Indian states can do the job from their home
• Resources can give their spare time or full time depending upon their availability

This article is going to end in the next few lines but we hope that it will seal the beginning of our journey with a powerful thrust towards a brighter future. After reading this, even if a single reader gets inspired and takes a positive step towards achieving a successful career in localization industry, we will think that our effort has been successful.

Though our Indian localization industry has still not achieved the maturity as compared to the European and other Asian countries, we will hope that in the coming years this subcontinent will stand tall and we will prove that like in all other fields, Indian localization industry is just as strong as the other countries – and together we will take the challenge and we will not allow it to merely become our legacy.

Localization Group, Modular Infotech
Mobile - +91 93701 46488
E-mail:kartiki@modular-infotech.com

Q. Could you please tell users of Modular Forum about Jagruti Andh Vidyalay and National Federation of The Blind Maharashtra(NFBM).

About THE NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND MAHARASHTRA (NFBM)

The NFBM is a registered social organization, which is ‘Of the Blind’, ‘For the Blind’ & successfully run ‘By the Blind’. It is the single largest self-helping democratic organization of the blind, representing 700,000 to 800,000 visually handicapped people of the Maharashtra state. It is struggling to strive for equality of opportunity for blind in the field of education, training & employment. It has promoted several schemes & projects for the upliftment of its fellow blind brethren; especially those who stay in the rural areas of the state through the branches, units & service centers situated at Mumbai (H.O), Pune, Nashik, Aurangabad, Nagpur, Amravati, Nanded, Jalana, Jalgaon, & Kolhapur.

About NFBM JAGRITI SCHOOL FOR BLIND GIRLS

Education, Training & Rehabilitation are the three most critical aspects for every blind individual to bring about quality improvement in their lives. There are 80 schools in Maharashtra state for educating the blind, unfortunately not more than 2500 visually challenged children are benefiting from these schools. In response to this situation, NFBM started ‘Jagriti School for Blind Girls’ on January 4, 1989.

This school is situated at Alandi Devachi. , Dist. Pune. At present 110 blind girls are housed in this school. Most of them are from the rural areas of Pune, Marathwada, Vidarbha & Khandesh. The NFBM Jagriti School For Blind Girls provides free education, lodging and boarding facilities to its deserving students. Regular academic coaching is given to children here along with provision for learning extra curricular skills like training in Information Technology, vocational training, craft, sports training, cultural skills & communication. Home science and music classes are specialties of the school. This school offers education up to the 7^th standard in its own premises. From 8^th standard onwards the girls attend the normal school at the Saint Dnyaneshwar High School, At Alandi Devachi, Dist. Pune under the integrated Education scheme.

Along with formal education our students are also provided with training in the basics of Information Technology. This training is conducted at the “Abilities Institute of IT Management, Education and Research”, which is a well equipped computer lab located in the school premises. Their progress & enthusiasm is indeed commendable.

Q. What is the current scenario of literacy of Visually Handicapped People in India? And How we can improve it further?

About literacy of the visually impaired

There is no imperial data which can give us an exact indication of the percentage of literacy amongst the visually impaired community. However it must be said that availability of any reading material in an accessible format specially in Braille is a major issue even in today’s dynamic and technologically advanced world. From the figures that are available we can draw in inference that only 0.5 to 1% of the ink print literature is currently been transcribed in Braille - both in case of English and Indian languages. Even today other than the Secondary School Certificate Board text books, very limited amount of self study material is available for our school going children, at college level availability of text books is also a question mark. This fact makes it difficult for the visually impaired to acquire education.

Lack of Braille literature is a result of many factors. One of them is scarcity of Braille transcription and printing facility. Braille is an expensive medium of education which results in high cost of Braille books. As Braille is an embossed script it makes the Braille books voluminous and virtually difficult to carry around. Considering this, about seven years ago an idea was discussed with Mr. Raghunandan and Meena Joshi from Modular Infotech to come up with a Braille refreshable display which will make it convenient for schools and other institutions working with the visually impaired to setup Braille digital libraries and provide the vast wealth of knowledge to their beneficiaries in a soft format. This new development of Braille refreshable displays which can give Braille output in Indian languages has resulted in improving the knowledge of Braille amongst the visually impaired. It has also opened the horizons for providing large numbers of books that are available for the normal people to our visually impaired counterparts.

Q. You are associated with us for last several years and using various products like Shree-Lipi Braille, Braille-Mitra developed by company. Please tell us something about this association / relations?

Our association with Modular Infotech

The idea of developing Braille-Mitra, a reading device for the visually impaired was conceived by Modular studying the needs of the visually impaired students at the NFBM Jagriti school for blind girls, and with good inputs from them. I still remember a large no of brain storming sessions which I used to have with Mr. and Mrs. Joshi. It all began with our requirement for a software which would help us to convert any Indian language digital book into Braille. I am eternally grateful to team Modular Infotech for considering our request and providing us with Shree-Lipi Braille. After Shree-Lipi Braille the next stage was the designing and developing of Braille-Mitra which Is not just a Braille refreshable display but an entire digital library.

At NFBM Jagriti school for blind girls we installed 3 units of Brialle-Mitra in the year 2011. Ever since then our institution has been using this equipment to help our students in learning to read paperless Braille. In the initial stages this equipment had a few limitations; especially it was only compatible to books which were available in Shree-Lipi format thus reducing the number of books which we could store on this device. However I must admit that team Modular has taken special efforts to listen to NGO and institutions like ours and taken our constructive feedback and has now come up with software which have made Braille-Mitra compatible to the internationally accepted standard BRF format.

Q. How would you describe contribution of Modular Infotech for Visually Handicapped People?

The development of the device like Braille-Mitra which I feel is our real friend has resulted in making Braille production economical and easy to access. Braille-Mitra completely avoids the necessity of providing hard copies of Braille books to our beneficiaries thus eliminating the cost of paper from the production process. This also makes Braille production environment friendly. My only suggestion to team Modular is that if we can try and come up with devices which are low cost and affordable to each visually impaired person the purpose of this technology will be really served.

Q.Any message for the reader of Forum?

My message to the readers

The world of the visually handicapped is the world of tactile and auditory perception. Life is a challenge when you live it in the absence of vision which provides you with 75% of your environmental stimulation. The only solution to this difficulty is advancement in technology both in the tactile and the auditory world. There Is no substitute to personal reading and writing skills and hence to Braille in case of the visually impaired. I plead with companies like Modular Infotech to keep up their enthusiasm and make tireless efforts in the direction of providing excellent solutions to the visually challenged to cope with their life.

How to convert previous data typed in Marathi using Shree-Lipi 1.0 to Shree-Lipi 6.0/7.3

First of all check that you have upgraded the Shree-Lipi 1.0 to Shree-Lipi 6.0/7.3, i.e. the Shree-Lipi Lock information of 6.0/7.3 should be matching to the original Shree-Lipi 1.0 lock. If the lock is not compatible then the conversion will not be in proper format.

Please follow the below procedure to convert Shree-Lipi 1.0 data to Shree-Lipi 4-5-6 layout.

1. First open the Input file and copy the data which you want to convert and paste it in WordPad or notepad application.
2. Now copy the data from WordPad or notepad application and open Exchange Utility.
3. In Exchange Utility Select Source as Clipboard.
4. Data Format as Text (TXT)
5. Language as Devnagari
6. Input Font Format as Shree-Lipi 1.0
7. Output Font Format as Shree-Lipi 4.0/5.0/6.0
8. Output to file. The output folder is C:\Shree70 by default, you can change this path.
9. Now click on Convert button.

You can open the converted file and apply Shree-Lipi 4-5-6 font.

Afterwards you can convert this data from Shree-Lipi 4-5-6 to Shree-Lipi 7 layout.

Note that if the data contains English text then you have to replace it manually. After conversion of data, proof reading and re-layouting is necessary.

Tip1 : Simple process to Control devices and printers in windows 7.

Device Manager is a powerful tool for managing hardware, for changing any printer or device; but it requires technical knowledge. Windows 7 has minimised this and introduced a more basic alternative in the Devices and Printers applet.

The first improvement is that it shows large icons and device names for major hardware items like monitor, mouse, hard drive, printer etc.).

The new applet can also save you time, though, by providing a quick and easy way to access relevant functions for each device. If you have got some printer-related issue, say, right-clicking your printer icon displays a list of useful options - See What's Printing, Printer Preferences, Printer Properties, Delete Printer Queue and more - and all you have to do is select whatever you need.

Just an example, one customer visited our office once saying that he is not able to print after upgrading to Windows 7. We just did the following –

Select “Devices and Printers”. It will show icons of all the installed devices and printers. Take the mouse pointer on the concerned printer and right click. Select Printer Properties and then select Ports tab. We found that it was showing Com1 port selected. It was changed to USB and the printer started working.

Tip2 : How ot Disable hibernation in windows 7

By default Windows 7 will permanently use large space of your hard disk with its hibernation file. If you never use sleep option and always turn your PC off, then this space will never actually be required. To disable hibernation and recover a little hard drive space, Open REGEDIT, browse to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power, then set both HibernateEnabled and HiberFileSizePerfect to zero.

It is with great sadness that we have to announce to our readers the demise of Mr. Prem Kumar, proprietor of M/s G.R. Computers, Asansol. Premji was the most passionate force behind promoting 'Shree-Lipi' in the Dhanbad-Asansol-Durgapur belt of West Bengal.

For more than 2 decades he has served the users of Shree-Lipi, which was his passion. It was not only selling of packages, but he always preferred to go an extra mile while explaining features of Shree-Lipi. He had great ability to go deeper and to understand the products thoroughly from users’ point of view. Premji has conducted several seminars for the users in Asansol area. His valuable contribution towards securing the prestigious Eastern Coalfields Ltd. (ECL) order was the result of the continuous efforts made by him over the years.

Directors and staff of Modular Infotech Pvt. Ltd would like to extend our deepest Sympathy and Condolences to Mr. Prem Kumar’s family. May God give them strength to bear this loss.

The measure of a life well-lived is not in how much money one has or what possessions they have accumulated, but rather through the lives they touched and the sorrow they leave behind.