[Ltru] Re: extlang
"Mark Davis" <mark.davis@icu-project.org> Wed, 29 August 2007 01:12 UTC
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Date: Tue, 28 Aug 2007 18:12:10 -0700
From: Mark Davis <mark.davis@icu-project.org>
To: John Cowan <cowan@ccil.org>
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Cc: LTRU Working Group <ltru@ietf.org>
Subject: [Ltru] Re: extlang
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> RFC 1766 already said that fallback doesn't always work, and sometimes > produces something unintelligible to the requester. > > But I believe you are misusing the term "macrolanguage". A macrolanguage > is not to be equated with a "main" or standardized variety. Some > macrolanguages like Chinese and Arabic have such varieties, others like > Quechua and Nahuatl do not. I'm not misusing it -- nothing I said had anything to do with the definition, it has to do with the functional implications. If a language yyy has the macrolanguage xx, we are talking about two possible representations a) extlang: xx-yyy b) lang: yyy The main reason I've heard from you for doing (a) instead of (b) is that (a) it has better fallback behavior. For that to be true, xx has to be a good fallback for users of yyy, in the majority of cases. And the value has to be worth having the extra structure. So, a natural question to ask is: are you sure that of ALL the languages on http://www.sil.org/iso639-3/macrolanguages.asp, the ones that we are talking about this mechanism for, that the fallback is indeed good. I really want some reasonable attention paid to the implications of this whole apparatus before we ship this, because once we do, it is irrevocable! There are (at least) two cases to consider here. 1. There is a predominent choice in the industry for the macro language. For example, the content for zh is typically always Mandarin; the content for ar is typically always standard Arabic. Look at the concrete implications. It means that whenever Joe looks for a web page in Hakka Chinese, he will typically fall back to Mandarin. Whenever Sarah looks for a page in Tunisian Arabic, it will fall back to standard Mandarin. If you are saying however, that zh is not necessarily Mandarin, that Arabic is not necessarily Standard Arabic, then we fall through to case 2. 2. There is not a predominant choice in the industry, let's say for Hmong. In this case, the situation is different. I could choose any of the Hmong for the content for hmn. We then have an even dicer case for the value of extlang. I localize my hmn locale with contents appropriate for Northeastern Dian Hmong; is that a good default for someone speaking Eastern Xiangxi Hmong? for Luopohe Hmong? For all the other Hmongs? For extlang to be a good apparatus, these always have to be good choices, since we are baking the structure into the tag. If Peter Constable came out and said the following, then I would admit to my sins, give in gracefully, and go along with extlang. - "Yes, each of the Hmongs (encompassed by hmn) are mutually intelligible, and are better for each one than another fallback like Chinese" - and the same is true for all the other cases with no predominant variant. - "Yes, standard Arabic is intelligible for all the encompassed languages from Algerian Saharan Arabic to Shihhi Arabic, and are better for each one than another fallback like French" - and the same is true for all the other cases with a predominant variant. Mark
_______________________________________________ Ltru mailing list Ltru@ietf.org https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ltru
- [Ltru] Re: IANA, UTF-8 and the Language Subtag Re… Frank Ellermann
- [Ltru] Re: extlang Doug Ewell
- [Ltru] Re: IANA, UTF-8 and the Language Subtag Re… Doug Ewell
- [Ltru] Re: extlang Doug Ewell
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Gerard Meijssen
- [Ltru] Re: extlang Doug Ewell
- RE: [Ltru] Re: extlang Peter Constable
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang John Cowan
- Re: [Ltru] Re: IANA, UTF-8 and the Language Subta… David Conrad
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Doug Ewell
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Karen_Broome
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang John Cowan
- Re: [Ltru] Re: IANA, UTF-8 and the Language Subta… Doug Ewell
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Doug Ewell
- [Ltru] Re: extlang Doug Ewell
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang John Cowan
- [Ltru] Numerical region subtags (RE: extlang) Don Osborn
- Re: [Ltru] Numerical region subtags (RE: extlang) Addison Phillips
- [Ltru] Re: Numerical region subtags (RE: extlang) Doug Ewell
- [Ltru] RE: Numerical region subtags (RE: extlang) Don Osborn
- [Ltru] Re: extlang Doug Ewell
- [Ltru] Re: extlang Doug Ewell
- [Ltru] Re: extlang Doug Ewell
- [Ltru] Re: extlang Doug Ewell
- [Ltru] Re: extlang Doug Ewell
- [Ltru] extlang Mark Davis
- Re: [Ltru] extlang Randy Presuhn
- [Ltru] Re: extlang John Cowan
- [Ltru] Re: extlang Mark Davis
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Martin Duerst
- Re: [Ltru] extlang Martin Duerst
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Martin Duerst
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Karen_Broome
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Randy Presuhn
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang John Cowan
- RE: [Ltru] Re: extlang Peter Constable
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Mark Davis
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Marion Gunn
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Marion Gunn
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Addison Phillips
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Marion Gunn
- [Ltru] Use of the string "microlangauges" Randy Presuhn
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Karen_Broome
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang John Cowan
- RE: [Ltru] Re: extlang Peter Constable
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Mark Davis
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Doug Ewell
- [Ltru] Re: extlang Doug Ewell
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Marion Gunn
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang John Cowan
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang GerardM
- [Ltru] Re: extlang Doug Ewell
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang John Cowan
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Doug Ewell
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang John Cowan
- RE: [Ltru] Re: extlang Peter Constable
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Addison Phillips
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang John Cowan
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Doug Ewell
- Re: [Ltru] Re: extlang Marion Gunn
- [Ltru] Availability of ISO documents (Was: extlang Stephane Bortzmeyer
- Re: [Ltru] Availability of ISO documents (Was: ex… John Cowan
- [Ltru] Re: Availability of ISO documents (Was: ex… Stephane Bortzmeyer
- [Ltru] Re: Availability of ISO documents (Was: ex… Marion Gunn