If you are just referring to East Asian languages support (namely, Traditional and Simplified Chinese, Japanese, and Korean), it is because the programs you mentioned are non-unicode programs.  Microsoft Outlook is another example - it cannot display the subject line but it can display email content.  There is a way to overcome this shortcoming and display one of the above languages - enable unicode support for non-unicode programs.  This example is for Traditional Chinese.  The example even shows a handwriting/characters recognition input method being included.  From what I have read in other discussion forums, there is one built into Japanese IMEs as well.

http://mister.m.spymac.net/faq/computer/winxpcht/index.html

You should note that by enabling Unicode support for non-unicode programs, some western letter/character combinations online may appear as east asian characters.  In addition, some installers (e.g., Sun Java, QuickCam) will instead install the east asian language version program/driver based on to whichever language your non-unicode program support is set.

Message Edited by esquire on 09-17-2004 10:40 AM