Spec edits: xml:lang and BCP47 reference

Hello Jonathan,

I'm going through the disposition of comments and the actions list,
trying to pull together the spec edits that need to be done. Here is
the first one I have found.

xsd:NCName is too constraining for lang attributes
http://dev.w3.org/webfonts/WOFF/DoC/issues-lc-2010.html#issue-7
and
I18n-ISSUE-4: Language tag references
http://dev.w3.org/webfonts/WOFF/DoC/issues-lc-2010.html#issue-10

The spec needs to be updated to reference BCP47,
which covers both the syntax of the attribute and the rules for
language matching. Current text is:

  The text elements MAY be given a lang attribute. The possible values
  for the lang attribute can be found in the IANA Subtag Registry
  [Subtag]. A user agent displaying metadata is expected to choose a
  preferred language/locale to display from among those available,
  following RFC 4647 [RFC-4647].

together with the edit for

I18n-ISSUE-2: Why not using xml:lang?
http://dev.w3.org/webfonts/WOFF/DoC/issues-lc-2010.html#issue-9

it seems to me that suitable replacement text would be

  The text elements MAY be given a lang attribute in the XML
  namespace [XML]. For backwards compatibility, lang attributes in the
  are also accepted in older content, and SHOULD be treated the same
  as xml:lang. New content SHOULD instead use xml:lang.

  The syntax of valued of the the xml:lang attribute can be found in
  BCP47 [BCP47]. A user agent displaying metadata is
  expected to choose a preferred language/locale to display from among
  those available, following BCP47.

The RNG is updated and checked in today, along with the examples
(apart from the two historical, 'real world' examples'. It may be
worth mentioning in the spec that these use the historical lang
attribute.

-- 
 Chris Lilley   Technical Director, Interaction Domain                 
 W3C Graphics Activity Lead, Fonts Activity Lead
 Co-Chair, W3C Hypertext CG
 Member, CSS, WebFonts, SVG Working Groups

Received on Tuesday, 24 May 2011 16:16:43 UTC