Right justified

March 18 2007

In preparing for my visit to Israel, I had a meeting last week with John Beck, the program director for Notes/Domino release management.  I asked John to give me the short course in localization issues for the Israeli market.  We talked about Hebrew translations and "bi-di" (bi-directional) language support.  The talk and follow-up with John was immensely helpful, but I missed something.  Until I walked into the conference room during a customer visit in Jerusalem today, I had never seen the Hebrew version of Notes.  And while I've known for most of my life that Hebrew is read from right to left, it still was a cognitive dissonance moment when presented with a mirror image Notes 7 client.  The folders were on the right side, the tabs ran from right to left...even the "X" to close window tabs was on the left.

I can't find a screen shot online today, but I'll be sure to grab one tomorrow.  Still, you probably get the idea.


The other thing that threw me off -- during what was a very very cool demonstration of a major in-house Notes application -- was that I found myself searching for the familiar.  The interface was 99% in Hebrew, but it was "my" product...I was just having a hard time recognizing things.  Did I mention that I can't read Hebrew without the vowel marks?  About the only word I actually recognized, other than proper names, was ספר,  (Sefer) the Hebrew word for "book" -- as in "name and address book".  Even that threw me off, since my most frequent encounter with <<ספר>> over the last many years is in the context of ספר תורה , or "book of the Torah".  So seeing it in the everyday usage was new to me.

Other notes from today:
  • Lunch was a fantastic mix of everything Middle Eastern at an Arab restaurant called "Abu Ghosh".  The hummus was, as promised, excellent.  It was finished off with the traditional Arab mint tea, too, which was quite refreshing.  The linked article, by the way, answers many of the questions I had during this lunch -- Arabs living in Israel, speaking Hebrew and welcoming all?  I knew there were Arab areas within Israel, but wanted to know much more.
  • Driving to Jerusalem, we passed a beautiful town called Modi'in, built in the rolling hills.  Modi'in is one of the few Israeli towns that has all utilities buried underground -- a contrast from the older areas of Tel Aviv I saw yesterday.
  • Israel used to be the only country in the world where IBM was written in the local language (as יבם).  However, last year, IBM Israel began using the familiar eight-bar logo.
  • It would be really, really really dangerous for my waistline if Max Brenner comes to Chicago.  So far, their only US presence is in New York.  Max, please keep it that way.  Between last year's trip to Australia and tonight's dinner, wow -- the best.

    Image:Right justified

Ed Brill | תֵּל־אָבִיב, ישראל Category:  Travel  Add/View Comments [8]

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  1. 1  David Gursky  | 3/18/2007 3:13:22 PM

    I went to THE college for all nice Jewish boys, yes, Brandeis University. Back then, the idea of a personal computer was a DECSystem 10 (it only took up part of a room, viz a System 360, which took up antire floor of a building, but I digress).

    On the wall was a sign with a familiar blue and white motif and the hebrew letters Eyin - Bet - Mem.

    Israeli Business Machines of course. What were YOU thinking?

  1. 2  Helen Carter  | 3/18/2007 7:49:35 PM

    Mmmmm... Max Brenner.

    It pays to live in Australia - my home is 10 minutes from my office, and dear old Max is half way between the two.

    Must be almost lunch time...

    Helen.

  1. 3  Keith Brooks http://kbmsg.blogspot.com | 3/18/2007 10:42:45 PM

    Ed,

    If you had asked I could have provided it all for you, but I figured you would have done it on your own.

    Yes it's amusing seeing it all in reverse and in a foreign language, but then by now I would think you woould have enabled your client to run most every language and way.

    I wrote a few articles back in R5 time frame on the bidi issues and how to enable it with screenshots.

    Of course every version since gets hebrew dates and calendar setup on my client so I can always keep up.

    If you were lucky you met a well knowledgeable man named yaakov shasha from IBM, I hope he is still there, Iris should have used him for the bi-di issues at one time. No offense to the team in Dublin who worked on it at the time.

    Max brenner chocolates are very good.

  1. 4  Rob Axelrod http://www.technotics.com | 3/19/2007 8:43:36 AM

    Hey Ed,

    If you come across anyone there who even remotely looks like they could use my expertise I'm always looking to wrangle a trip to the Holy Land. Tell them I'll work cheap (relatively).

    Enjoy your trip!

    Rob

  1. 5  Keith Brooks http://kbmsg.blogspot.com | 3/19/2007 8:46:06 AM

    ROb, you and all the rest of us :-)

  1. 6  John Head http://www.johndavidhead.com | 3/19/2007 2:11:00 PM

    First, John Beck rocks. I have known John since back in the day and he has always been one of the guys behind the scenes working his butt off. Seeing him behind the 8 release was a great vote of confidence for myself.

    Second, I am curious to why there is the difference in the reading orientation. I know its probably "us" that changed, not them .. but anyone have any resources I can read about it?

  1. 7  Stuart Bogom  | 3/19/2007 2:42:56 PM

    @4: Gom ani! (Count me in, too)

  1. 8  Mike Burford  | 3/20/2007 12:02:56 AM

    @4: And me!