Alternatives for the term 'primary language'

The new WCAG draft is using the term 'primary language' in a different way than we have defined it in  "Authoring Techniques for XHTML & HTML Internationalization: Specifying the language of content 1.0" [1].  There are other, older, uses of the term 'primary language' that also do not conform to our usage in this document.

In addition, 'primary language' doesn't really convey the meaning of the idea expressed at [1].  The meaning is intended to convey the language of the intended audience of the document, referring to the document as a whole, and contrasted with 'text-processing language' in that more than one language value makes sense in some circumstances.

Perhaps the time has come to think of an alternative term.

We would like your suggestions.

Brainstormed suggestions so far include:
 document language
 audience language
 web unit language
 language metadata
 language metadata declaration
 document language metadata
 readership language
 default langauge
 base language
 main language

'Document language' seemed interesting at one point, but is probably not specific enough - particularly when the term is translated into other languages.

Current favourites are 
 readership language (sounds a bit clunky)
 audience language

Please read [1] and [2] and tell us if you have any better suggestions.

Thanks,
RI



[1] http://www.w3.org/TR/i18n-html-tech-lang/#ri20040808.101452727
[2] http://www.w3.org/TR/i18n-html-tech-lang/#ri20040808.102523274


============
Richard Ishida
Internationalization Lead
W3C (World Wide Web Consortium)

http://www.w3.org/People/Ishida/
http://www.w3.org/International/
http://people.w3.org/rishida/blog/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ishida/

Received on Monday, 26 June 2006 10:00:50 UTC