Re: [Ltru] Applicability Statement for the IANA registry established by 4646

["Phillips, Addison" <[e-mail]>]

(as a contributor)

Okay, we've had some edit proposals and comments. I have incorporated them into the text below, editing as appropriate for style, grammar, and flow. Generally I took Mark's comments on Randy's comments. I adapted Peter's suggested (positive) text as an introduction, although it is substantially modified to make it "naïve-user" friendly (per Randy) :-).

So... how about:

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Section x.x.x Applicability of the Subtag Registry

The Language Subtag Registry is the source of data elements used to construct language tags, following rules described in this document. Language tags are intended for use as metadata that describes the linguistic attributes of "information objects" (content, which, in addition to text, can include most media formats such as video or audio). They also form the basis for language and locale negotiation in various protocols and APIs.

The registry is therefore applicable to many applications that need some form of language identification, with these limitations:

  - It is not designed to be the sole data source in the creation of a language selection user interface. For example, the registry does not contain translations for subtag descriptions or for tags composed from the subtags. Sources for localized data based on the registry are generally available, notably [CLDR]. Nor does the registry indicate which subtag combinations are particularly useful or relevant.

   - It does not provide information indicating relationships between different languages, such as might be used in a user interface to select language tags hierarchically, regionally, or on some other organizational model.

    - It does not supply information about potential overlap between different language tags, as the notion of what constitutes a language is not precise: several different language tags might be reasonable choices for the same given piece of content. 

    - It does not contain information about appropriate fallback choices when performing language negotiation. A good fallback language might be linguistically unrelated to the specified language. The fact that one language is often used as a backup language for another is usually a result of outside factors, such as geography, history, or culture--factors which might not apply in all cases. For example, most people who use Breton (a Celtic language used in the Northwest of France) would probably prefer to be served French (a Romance language) if Breton isn't available.
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Addison Phillips
Globalization Architect -- Lab126

Internationalization is not a feature.
It is an architecture.