RE: 3-Letter Language Code

> 
> 
> Not true.
> 
> Simplified and Traditional Chinese are two different code pages.
[...] 
> > 3) Which codes should we use for Simplified Chinese
> >      and Traditional Chinese?
> >      Is it CHS and CHT respectively?
> >      or CHN and TWN respectively?
> 
> I think you should use 'chi' for both (though I'm not 100% sure). Simplified
> and
> Traditional Chinese are the same *language*.

The standards for HTML and HTTP try to make a clear distinction
between languages and character encodings. A "code page" refers to
a character encoding, (also known as "charset" in the jargon of MIME
though this term is misleading), not to a human language.

There is nothing in the protocols that forces you to use any particular 
convention for file naming on your web server, so long as you send
the right HTTP headers. (Though some would-be "smart" clients may try to
detect MIME-type and encoding in other ways.)

But if you are trying to align local convention with some international
standard, you should be clear on what kind of standard it is.

It might make as much sense to use totally arbitrary file types, like .001
for the combinations of language and encoding that actually will
occur on your server, if that's some known, finite set, and then
configure the HTTP server to send the right headers.

--
    Albert Lunde          Albert-Lunde@northwestern.edu (new address)
                          Albert-Lunde@nwu.edu (old address)

Received on Tuesday, 26 December 2000 00:10:18 UTC