gt5050

We are in the process of building a reporting tool that would be mostly used by sales / marketing executives to monitor ROI.

This is not a consumer facing product rather a B2B product.

We are unable to decide whether to internationalize/localize the application or not.

Here are the two approaches we are thinking

1) Launch English only for now, but plan for localization in the future

Pros:

Make the product accessible for a larger market

Cons:

Long term maintainence cost (translation would be needed for every new screen-string pair)

Seems a bit like premature optimization

2) Dont internationalize at all, given that this is not a consumer facing product

Pros: Simplify development and maintainence over long term, not having to deal with I18N

Cons: Loose out on new audience who would like to use the software in their own language

What approach would you recommend?

Also HNers whose first language is not English,

1) Roughly what percentage of software you use has option available for your language

2) Do you prefer to use software in your language if there is an option available

3) Does not having your language impact productivity while using the software.

Thanks!