Re: [IndexedDB] Languages for collation

On Thu, Aug 12, 2010 at 11:19 AM, Jonas Sicking <jonas@sicking.cc> wrote:

> On Wed, Aug 11, 2010 at 11:28 PM, Pablo Castro
> <Pablo.Castro@microsoft.com> wrote:
> > We had some discussions about collation algorithms and such in the past,
> but I don't think we have settled on the language aspect of it. In order to
> have stores and indexes sort character-based keys in a way that is
> consistent with users' expectations we'll have to take indication in the API
> of what language we should use to collate strings.
> >
> > Trying to take a minimalist approach, we could add an optional parameter
> on the database open call that indicates the language to use (e.g. "en" or
> "en-UK", etc.). If the language is not specified and the database does not
> exist, then we can use the current browser/OS language to create the
> database. If not specified and database already exists, then use the one
> it's already there (this accommodates the fact that a user may be able to
> change their default language in the browser/OS after the database has been
> created using the default). If the language is specified and the database
> already exists and the specified language is not the one the database has
> then we'll throw an exception (same behavior as with "description", although
> we have that one in flight right now as well).
> >
> > We should probably also add a read-only attribute to the database object
> that exposes the language.
> >
> > If this works for folks I can write a proposal for the specific changes
> to the spec.
>
> If we make it part of the database open call, then that makes it
> impossible to change the sorting order of an existing database, no?
> This seems like it could be a problem. I.e. it quite possible that an
> application will want to allow the user to change the sorting
> language, for example when changing the language of the UI.
>
> One solution would be to allow language to be set as part of the
> setVersion call.
>

Whether it's per-database or more fine grained I think it absolutely must be
part of setVersion.  Changing the language will be a very heavyweight
operation that'll require a similar level of isolation to "schema" changes
of the database.  (Not sure how I missed this point of Pablo's original
email.)

J