Many developers today are looking to save development time by incorporating existing libraries that provide Unicode functionality such as character set conversion, normalization, collation, etc.

Open Source is a way to acquire Unicode support and still retain the ability to customize functionality to meet legacy or proprietary needs. But how well do these approaches work?

This panel discussion forum will give a brief introduction for two or three Open Sourced libraries that enable applications to support Unicode.

The introduction will cover the Unicode capabilities provided and the objectives, charter and policies of the Open-Source products. The panelists will share their comments and concerns in enabling Unicode support in their products and working in Open Source environments.

The panelists will then respond to audience questions about Unicode enabling and the discussion will include the pros and cons of Open Source approach to develop software.