Swiss german, spoken

[John.Cowan]

Karen_Broome at spe.sony.com scripsit:

> zh-cms or zh-cmn? Does this construction exist today or does it have the 
> same problem as "gsw" -- it's not allowed unless 639-3 is published and 
> included in RFC 3066?

It's a bizarre situation.  Right now the registered RFC 3066 tag
for Mandarin is zh-guoyu.  When ISO 639-3 is incorporated in the RFC
3066 scheme, the standard tag will be zh-cmn, and zh-guoyu will be a
grandfathered equivalent -- permanently valid, but deprecated for new uses.
(This assumes that there are no changes in codes before 639-3 becomes final.)

If we act *now*, we can register zh-cmn (deprecating zh-guoyu) for
Mandarin generally, zh-cmn-Hant for Mandarin in traditional script,
and zh-cmn-Hans for Mandarin in simplified script.  Due to changes in
our process, however, we will temporarily lose this flexibility shortly.
So if you expect to need these classifications in the next year or so,
please file forms right away.

Likewise, zh-yue-Hant and zh-yue-Hans for Cantonese in traditional and
simplified script respectively can likewise be registered now,
assuming that Cantonese is ever written in simplified script.
The tag zh-yue will not be deprecated in future (on the same
assumption as above).

> Were there some recent additions to the Chinese codes?

No.

> Ideally, I would also like to avoid using zh-Hant and zh-Hans without the 
> Mandarin descriptor, though that will suit our business needs today. I 
> just wanted to confirm that there aren't currently any registered codes 
> that will allow me to express in a single code 
> Chinese-*Mandarin*-Traditional.

Currently not, but if you want them, get them while they're hot.

-- 
John Cowan  jcowan at reutershealth.com  www.reutershealth.com  www.ccil.org/~cowan
No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the
continent, a part of the main.  If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a
manor of thy friends or of thine own were: any man's death diminishes me,
because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for
whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.  --John Donne