[Docs] Internationalisation of IC.

David Taylor docs@lists.akopia.com
Wed, 18 Jul 2001 12:27:16 +1000


I am currently implementing Interchange (version 4.6.5) for our site (still
developing) at www.cpscomp.com.au/cgi-bin.cps_shop. I am in Australia and
from this we identified a small problem with currencies and weights. We
cannot just display prices as '$10.00' as e-commerce is a global thing, our
site is intended really for a regional exposure so we decided to display it
as 'AU$10.00'. This satisfies and identifies the currency involved. As we
are a metric country (a majority of the world) the weights which are
involved in the shipping calculations are displayed in the admin interface
as pounds where it should be grams.

Neither of these items show up in the documentation of Interchange. I feel
it should be addressed possibly in the FAQ section of the 'Interchange
Installation' manual.

I found the required changes are:
Currency display '$' to 'AU$' was made in catalog/products/locale.txt in the
line currency_symbol by altering the US entry.
'Weight in pounds' to 'Weight in grams' is changed in
catalog/products/mv_metadata.asc in the line products::weight by altering
the text of 'pounds' to 'grams' .

If Interchange had already been started and the databases created then an
alternative to these changes is to access the files via the admin interface.
That is:
UI/administration/tables/edit locale/currency_symbol - change to required/OK
UI/administration/tables/edit mv_metadata/limit with search
[weight]/products::weight/label - change pounds to grams/OK
If required then export both files for completeness.

Otherwise it is a very interesting product.

Cheers David Taylor.