Tagging transliterations from a specific script

[Phillips, Addison]

> >> What is wrong with that? The use of -alalc92 in those contexts couldn't
> mean anything else.
> >
> > Except to a computer, which may look at a tag like tt-Arab-something and set
> the environment to RTL, or just tell the user that the text is in the Arabic script.
> Even humans who don't know the registry well would probably assume that was
> in Arabic script.
> 
> No, it is the characters themselves which have RTL properties and which invoke
> such behavioural functionality. The language tag is not the place for the
> computer to determine that.
> 
Base direction is sometimes determined from language information. The Unicode bidirectional algorithm sometimes requires this help in order to render text correctly in certain contexts. For example, we use book metadata to determine the (base) direction to set for the title and author of a book. A title (for example) containing weakly directional characters may not draw properly if the direction is set improperly.

Addison

Addison Phillips
Globalization Architect (Lab126)
Chair (W3C I18N, IETF IRI WGs)

Internationalization is not a feature.
It is an architecture.