Re: Could ISO-639 languages be defined as skos concepts?

Hi all,

I'm trying to understand what you want to achieve: Is it URIs for
language values, e.g. http://www.w3.org/2004/02/skos/language#en-US ?

I don't think that it is feasible to have everything after "#" as an
URI, since RFC 4646 or its successor define a grammar for language tags.
That is, you cannot have a finite set of URIs built out of that.

Have you thought of registering an XPointer scheme at W3C? E.g.
something like "language()" which can be used e.g. in
http://www.w3.org/2004/02/skos/language#(en-US) . You would have to
define that the scheme data "()" contains an BCP 47 identifier.

Felix

Bernard Vatant wrote:
> Sue Ellen
> 
> Thanks for all this. I will munch over it and try to come up with
> something by the first week of January, when everybody is out of the
> bubbles ... :-)
> 
> Bernard
> 
> Sue Ellen Wright a écrit :
>> Hi, All,
>> Indeed, I suspect that lots of people would be delighted if someone
>> wants to go ahead with this for SKOS, provided that no one has already
>> started such a project. Rather than searching for IANA, you want to
>> reference IETF BCP 47, which will be your permanent ID reference for
>> the Language Tags. My contacts on BCP 47 are Felix Sasaki, Addison
>> Phillips, and Mark Davis, but as noted, they may possibly be off line
>> right now, as many people are. On the ISO side, Gerhard Budin is the
>> Chair of ISO TC 37/SC 2, whose WG 2 is responsible for the 639 family
>> of standards. I know that he shares my view that any new initiatives
>> in this area should be oriented toward the set of codes and the syntax
>> rules contained in the current IETF RFC 4645, 4646 and 4647, taking
>> into consideration any successor recommendations of the IETF. (There
>> is, for instance, a current effort to update the recently approved
>> RFCs to bring documents into compliance with the new ISO 639-3, which
>> essentially identifies the SIL Ethnologue codes as the extended codes
>> for comprehensive identification of languages. Also bear in mind (I
>> probably said this in another email) that when it comes to xml:lang,
>> we need to concern ourselves with langauge tags per IETF, not just
>> language codes alone.
>>  
>> Sorry I'm not coming up with the absolute final answer here, but
>> sooner or later, one of the IETF guys will check his mail!
>> Best regards
>> Sue Ellen
>>
>>  
>> On 12/21/06, *Bernard Vatant* <bernard.vatant@mondeca.com
>> <mailto:bernard.vatant@mondeca.com>> wrote:
>>
>>     Sue Ellen
>>     > I think you are absolutely right about this not being a significant
>>     > task: the main issue is to get a variety of people from a number of
>>     > communities of practice to agree on a single approach.
>>     Sure enough. But at least we could help proposing at least one. :-)
>>     > SKOS would certainly be one avenue. There may be others, and in the
>>     > end, we may need more than one flavor in order to conform to
>>     > requirements in a given environment, which is OK as long as we
>>     can map
>>     > successfully back and forth.
>>     Yes, this is a good use case for mapping, either SKOS-to-SKOS
>> mapping,
>>     or mapping from some RDF dialect to another. You know it's one of my
>>     favourite topics.
>>     > I'm hoping that sooner or later one of the guys for W3C will weigh
>>     > into this discussion and let us know whether they are already
>>     > addressing this issue.
>>     I've been searching the W3C I18n Activity
>>     http://www.w3.org/International/ which looks to me the place where
>>     such
>>     things should happen, but it looks like at first sight there is no
>>     connection between this activity and the SW activity. I will
>>     investigate
>>     further.
>>     > It's a bad time of year to hope to catch everybody monitoring their
>>     > email!
>>     Indeed. By the way, Happy Xmas to all :-)
>>
>>     Bernard
>>     > There will be an ISO TC 37 meeting in January where we'll be
>>     > addressing issues regarding our own metadata registry, and this
>> will
>>     > surely come up.
>>     > Best regards
>>     > Sue Ellen
>>     >
>>     > On 12/21/06, *Bernard Vatant* < bernard.vatant@mondeca.com
>>     <mailto:bernard.vatant@mondeca.com>
>>     > <mailto:bernard.vatant@mondeca.com
>>     <mailto:bernard.vatant@mondeca.com>>> wrote:
>>     >
>>     >     Hi Sue Ellen
>>     >
>>     >     Thanks for your insights. Do you have pointers to the
>>     discussions you
>>     >     mention, and/or any contact with people taking part in them,
>>     and who
>>     >     would see some interest in RDF-ization of  those resources?
>>     (assuming
>>     >     such a class definition is satisfiable).
>>     >     Actually when one looks at
>>     >     http://www.iana.org/assignments/language-subtag-registry
>>     >     < http://www.iana.org/assignments/language-subtag-registry>,
>> the
>>     >     technical
>>     >     task of migrating its content into RDF, as long as a relevant
>>     >     vocabulary
>>     >     is defined, is quite trivial.
>>     >     After that it's mainly a political issue. :-)
>>     >     But there is a point that has not been answered so far in my
>>     original
>>     >     question. Would SKOS a relevant format for such a
>>     representation?
>>     >
>>     >     Bernard
>>     >
>>     >
>>     >     Sue Ellen Wright a écrit :
>>     >     > Hi, All,
>>     >     > There's serious discussions going on concerning the IETF
>>     >     language tag
>>     >     > subtag registry and the ISO implementations of the 639
>>     family of
>>     >     > codes, so I think it makes sense to coordinate any efforts
>>     in this
>>     >     > direction with the folks working on those two sets of
>>     standards.
>>     >     IETF
>>     >     > 4647 spells out means for matching codes, but it would
>>     make things a
>>     >     > lot simpler if we have a more or less standard format for
>>     >     representing
>>     >     > them in rdf.
>>     >     > Bye for now
>>     >     > Sue Ellen
>>     >     >
>>     >     >
>>     >     > On 12/20/06, *Thomas Baker* <baker@sub.uni-goettingen.de
>>     <mailto:baker@sub.uni-goettingen.de>
>>     >     <mailto:baker@sub.uni-goettingen.de
>>     <mailto:baker@sub.uni-goettingen.de> >
>>     >     > <mailto:baker@sub.uni-goettingen.de
>>     <mailto:baker@sub.uni-goettingen.de>
>>     >     <mailto:baker@sub.uni-goettingen.de
>>     <mailto:baker@sub.uni-goettingen.de>> >> wrote:
>>     >     >
>>     >     >
>>     >     >     On Mon, Dec 18, 2006 at 06:54:18PM +0100, Bernard
>>     Vatant wrote:
>>     >     >     > ISO-639 languages are used in XML and in RDF, and in
>>     SKOS, via
>>     >     >     their
>>     >     >     > code used as value of xml:lang attribute.
>>     >     >     > But for various applications, it would be
>> interesting to
>>     >     define
>>     >     >     those
>>     >     >     > languages as proper RDF resources.
>>     >     >     >
>>     >     >     > So far, the only attempt to do so I've found in RDF is
>>     >     >     > http://downlode.org/rdf/iso-639/ and the description it
>>     >     provides is
>>     >     >     > quite basic.
>>     >     >     ...
>>     >     >
>>     >     >     > So, we have public concepts, a lot of data to mine, we
>>     >     have use
>>     >     >     cases,
>>     >     >     > all we need is a namespace to which append ISO 639
>>     codes to
>>     >     >     forge URIs.
>>     >     >     > Who is likely to host and maintain that namespace?
>>     >     >     > http://www.w3.org/2004/02/skos/language#
>>     >     >     <http://www.w3.org/2004/02/skos/language#>  ?
>>     >     >     > http://purl.org/dc/language/
>>     <http://purl.org/dc/language/>  ?
>>     >     >     ...
>>     >     >     > Since I think we can wait for quite a while before ISO
>>     >     delivers
>>     >     >     such a
>>     >     >     > thing in its own namespace - and I would be happy to
>>     be proven
>>     >     >     wrong
>>     >     >     > here - I wonder what kind of initiative could move
>>     this thing
>>     >     >     forward.
>>     >     >     > Is it in DCMI intention to define those instances in
>>     its own
>>     >     >     namespace
>>     >     >     > (Tom, any clues on that?).
>>     >     >
>>     >     >     Well, I agree with the need :-)
>>     >     >
>>     >     >     Several years ago, we considered opening a DCMI
>>     service for the
>>     >     >     "registration" of URIs identifying controlled
>>     vocabularies for
>>     >     >     use as encoding schemes in metadata.  While the demand
>>     for such
>>     >     >     a service was clear, the project did not look
>>     maintainable,
>>     >     >     sustainable, and scalable.
>>     >     >
>>     >     >     Unless URIs are coined "once and for all" and "with no
>>     >     >     guarantees" (and how useful is that?), it is not clear
>>     >     >     how such a namespace host should operate over time.  The
>>     >     >     impulse to "just do it" comes up against hard questions.
>>     >     >     Even just maintaining URIs for entities in a separately
>>     >     >     maintained ISO standard would involve a significant
>>     commitment.
>>     >     >
>>     >     >     Tom
>>     >     >
>>     >     >     --
>>     >     >     Tom Baker - tbaker@tbaker.de <mailto:tbaker@tbaker.de>
>>     <mailto:tbaker@tbaker.de <mailto:tbaker@tbaker.de>>
>>     >     <mailto:tbaker@tbaker.de <mailto:tbaker@tbaker.de>
>>     <mailto:tbaker@tbaker.de <mailto:tbaker@tbaker.de>>> -
>>     >     >     baker@sub.uni-goettingen.de
>>     <mailto:baker@sub.uni-goettingen.de>
>>     >     <mailto:baker@sub.uni-goettingen.de
>>     <mailto:baker@sub.uni-goettingen.de>> <mailto:
>>     >     baker@sub.uni-goettingen.de
>>     <mailto:baker@sub.uni-goettingen.de>
>>     <mailto:baker@sub.uni-goettingen.de
>>     <mailto:baker@sub.uni-goettingen.de>>>
>>     >
>>     >
>>     > <mailto:sewright@neo.rr.com <mailto:sewright@neo.rr.com>>
>>
>>
>>     < http://mondeca.wordpress.com/>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> -- 
>> Sue Ellen Wright
>> Institute for Applied Linguistics
>> Kent State University
>> Kent OH 44242 USA
>> sellenwright@gmail.com <mailto:sellenwright@gmail.com>
>> swright@kent.edu <mailto:swright@kent.edu>
>> sewright@neo.rr.com <mailto:sewright@neo.rr.com>
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Received on Friday, 22 December 2006 02:16:09 UTC