The BIG obstacles to multi-language computing are computer keyboards, operating systems and spell-checkers/dictionaries. It is very difficult to write in sever

The BIG obstacles to multi-language computing are computer keyboards, operating systems and spell-checkers/dictionaries. It is very difficult to write in several languages on all common operating systems. Sure you can have an English keyboard and use some on-screen means for writing accented characters but that is a real pain if you want to write more than a few words. There is no such thing as a "universal" keyboard. If there were, it would have to be enormous. Just look at the newspaper typesetting keyboards for Chinese newspapers. Most operating systems can be configured to handle a single language, but very awkward when you want to seamlessly switch to another. Spell-checkers/dictionaries in other languages are not as capable, accurate as English ones. So ... if we wish to promote real multi-lingual web, we really need to address these core issues. Having unicode and different character sets is but a very small part of the solution. There is lots more work to be done.