Reminder: Ulster Scots

[Doug Ewell]

Michael Everson <everson at evertype dot com> wrote:

>> Or will we merely see a gradual evolution/expansion of the existing 
>> list? If the orthography is organic or merely documents actual usage 
>> or represent a specific direction in orthographic reform, perhaps 
>> tying the subtag to a date is unnecessarily strict.
>
> That date refers to a particular document specifying the orthography. 
> We did the same thing with French and Belarusian.

For French we were intentionally capturing two historical snapshots 
("Late Middle French" and "Early Modern French") and used the 
publication dates 1606 and 1694 as historical references.  For 
Belarusian we were trying hard to avoid the generic terms "academic" and 
"academy," and used the date of the standard for this purpose after much 
hand-wringing.

I agree that for the most part, dates in subtags are unnecessarily 
inscrutable, and we should try to avoid them except when they are 
genuinely relevant to the identity of the variant being identified. 
Many language variations are codified in documents, which happen to have 
been written or published in a certain year, which might not mean 
anything to users.

I would be fine with "robinson" or some variation, as opposed to 
"ulster," if that would provide a better hint that Robinson's 
orthography, and not the dialect, is what is being represented.

--
Doug Ewell  |  Thornton, Colorado, USA  |  http://www.ewellic.org
RFC 5645, 4645, UTN #14  |  ietf-languages @ http://is.gd/2kf0s ­