RE: meta content-language

Hi.   Just a question.  If meta is to specify the text processing language,
how would people who do not have access to the http headers specify the target audience language?

I'd like to see a meta tag for that too.

--C. E. Whitehead
cewcathar@hotmail.com

> From: ishida@w3.org
> To: ian@hixie.ch
> CC: public-html@w3.org; www-international@w3.org
> Date: Wed, 27 Aug 2008 12:14:03 +0100
> Subject: RE: meta content-language
>
>
> +1 to the arguments that many people on this thread have already been making
> (while I was away) for avoiding the redefinition of meta content-language in
> HTML5. I'd just like to add a couple of points.
>
> First, if we're looking for a way of using the meta element rather than
> disallowing it, why not simply propose that it be treated as equivalent to
> an HTTP header declaration, and clearly specify that browsers can use the
> initial item in any sequence of values for the meta content-language as a
> fallback for the default text-processing language where there is no language
> attribute. I believe that this was the original intent, and I suspect that
> this would be consistent with its use in current pages, while still
> preserving the possibility to use the meta element principally as metadata.
> ( Of course, one would then need to define the relationship between any HTTP
> header and the meta tag when both are applied to a page.)
>
> Second, I don't think we should base our rationale for features solely on
> past or current practice. Eg, even though there are few applications
> processing in-document language metadata at the moment, it seems feasible to
> me that there may be in the future, and that we shouldn't close the door on
> that possibility by changing the meta element to be yet another way of just
> setting the text-processing language - especially since we currently have a
> way of allowing for both attributes and meta data to co-exist.
>
> RI
>
> ============
> Richard Ishida
> Internationalization Lead
> W3C (World Wide Web Consortium)
>
> http://www.w3.org/International/
> http://rishida.net/
>

Received on Wednesday, 27 August 2008 16:43:43 UTC