Janice Campbell's Weblog: Localization & Netbeans

Today is Independence Day in the US. Families and friends gather together to barbecue, swim, play sports, picnic in parks, eat watermelon, enjoy each other's company, and watch fireworks displays.

The founders of this country fought for people to be able to think freely and pursue their beliefs without repercussions.

Today, I honor Amaury Rodríguez Pérez, a developer and NetBeans fan from Cuba, who, because of US export laws, is unable to freely download NetBeans. My hope is that one day the political issues between our two countries will be healed. Hope for equality, liberty and justice around the world.

Amaury and his son Adrian showing off the NetBeans 6 and Translation Team tshirts.

They have finally arrived! These were designed by the NetBeans global TranslatedFiles (Localization) Community, which encompasses developers, fans, and students from Africa, Asia, Latin America and Europe! If you are a member of the community, you know how to contact me.

I am pleased and proud to announce that the Japanese, Simplified Chinese and Brazilian Portuguese versions of NetBeans 6.1 are now available for download. A special thanks to the Sun Globalization team but especially to the TranslatedFiles community contributors for their support, collaboration and contributions.

View the story and download the bits.

Did you know that people are blogging about NetBeans in 13 (yes, THIRTEEN) languages on Planet NetBeans? More bloggers showed up as a result of the blogging contest.

You will find the names of the winners there, and as I mentioned previously, 50% are non-English blogs. It's a big win for non-native English speakers. I know you all like to work with English UI for the most part, but it's nice to know you can have technical discussions with your linguistic peers in a language that suits you.

I would like to thank the many judges who were not mentioned but who took time out of their busy schedules to honestly evaluate the blogs and help us consider the winners. Let me tell you something about a few of them (they gave me permission to brag about them).

Let's start with Portuguese because I'm sure all the Brazilian NetBeans bloggers and community know them: Vinicius Senger, Mauricio Leal and Felipe Gaúcho.

Vinicius is a long time Java developer who owns a training and certification company in Brazil. Additionally, he is a NetBeans DreamTeam member, JUG lead and Java Champion and frequent contributor to NetBeans and Java projects, to recognize just a few of his many accomplishments.

Mauricio is also a JUG lead and who recently got hired by Sun Learning Services. This Developer Community Maven was part of the NetBeans Latin America Tour part 1 (Brazil, Argentina, Chile...) with Bruno Souza, Tim Boudreau and a few others. If you saw the video on netbeans.tv, it looks like they did not get a lot of sleep on that tour!

And lastly, there is Felipe Vieira Silva (most know him as Gaúcho) who is Brazilian but lives in Switzerland. He is a JUG lead and Java Champion and you can read all about him on his own blog http://weblogs.java.net/blog/felipegaucho/.

Next blog: Meet the Spanish judges.