- From: <Harald.T.Alvestrand@uninett.no>
- Date: Fri, 03 Nov 1995 10:06:25 +0100
- To: Glenn Adams <glenn@stonehand.com>
- Cc: Balint Nagy Endre <bne@bne.ind.eunet.hu>, Jeffrey Mogul <mogul@pa.dec.com>, http WG <http-wg%cuckoo.hpl.hp.com@hplb.hpl.hp.com>
Glenn,
what I desire is that we have a single decision that is valid
every time we want to indicate a language.
In this case, it means that if you think 1766 is broken, you should
work to change 1766, not introduce an incompatible naming scheme
within the HTML I18N work.
(You're not the only one - I also complained to the SRVLOC group
about their desire to use a fixed-length language field of FOUR
characters. SIL codes would fit right in...)
When we choose to rely on an outside source for names, we have to
consider:
- Is the source available?
- Is the source stable?
- Is the source reliable?
- Is the source policy acceptable to our members?
In the case of ISO, we might not like everything they are doing,
but its warts are something we have grown used to over the years.
In the case of SIL, I know that they chose to do their work for
a specific purpose (supporting and targeting the work of bible
translation into new languages), but I do not know anything about
their policies about changes to the language database, documentation
of changes or reuse of deassigned identifiers.
I don't say that these argue against SIL codes, just that we have
to know what we are doing, and make sure we change the standard
in the right place.
Harald A
Received on Friday, 3 November 1995 01:13:06 UTC