[Building Sakai] JSF dir attribute and its i18n implications - request for feedback

[DAVID ROLDAN MARTINEZ]

         Hi all,

         Reading Java EE 6  Tutorial, Volume II (http://download.oracle.com/javaee/6/tutorial/doc/javaeetutorial6.pdf), I've noticed that Input and Output JSF tags has a dir attribute that overrides the default text directionality for this component. The values accepted for this component are "LTR" (left-to-right) and "RTL" (right-to-left), which is something I didn't know.

         If this works, and I suppose it will, we should extend user preferences to include directionality preference and study how to include it when displaying messages to the user. In respect to this, I have several concerns:
a) If the solution is to modify ResourceLoader so that it can be able to provide the string properly formatted, depending on user preferred directionality. Is possible to format text according to directionality? I don't think so. Take a look at "Java Internationalization", Deistch&Czarnecki, O'Reilly, page 153: "[...]Java does not provide a mechanism to determine the directionality of a character [...] Java rendering engine takes care of rendering text properly"
b) If the solution is to modify each JSF app to include dir attribute where it applies retrieving directionality preference from a JavaBean and/or PreferencesService. This is not very scalable. Too many work to do (thousand of jsp pages to modify!!!!).
c) If this is worth to create JIRA ticket associated to this because all Sakai tools would have blocker tickets as no tool can adapt generated content depending on directionality. This is not very practical.

         Has anybody of you tested this? Any experience? If someone from an arabic-spoken country is reading this, until what point is this Sakai lack of support slowing down the adoption rate in your country? I mean,as far as I know, Moodle or Bb (not sure) has no support for directionality. What LMS are you using?
 
        I would appreciate any comments, suggestions, feedback, ideas or whatever...

        Thank you very much in advance.

         Dr. David Roldán Martínez
         Universitat Politècnica de València
         Sakai CLE QA Lead for Internationazation