We absolutely have the means to document it -- that's what the descriptions and comments are for. I like Addison's suggested style:<br><br> Prefix: hy<br> Comments: Prefix 'hy': Western Armenian, as distinct from<br> the Eastern dialect.
<br><br><br>So let's suppose that a year from now we decide that Western Saho needs to be distinguished from other dialects. Then we'd see the request for a registration of the form:<br><br> Prefix: ssy<br> Comments: Prefix 'ssy': Western Saho, as distinct from
<br> the Eastern and Southern dialects.<br><br>(I think comments are sufficient, but we could also use descriptions.)<br><br>Mark<br><br>AFAICT?<br><br><div><span class="gmail_quote">On 8/29/06, <b class="gmail_sendername">
Peter Constable</b> <<a href="mailto:petercon@microsoft.com">petercon@microsoft.com</a>> wrote:</span><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
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<p><font color="navy" face="Arial" size="2"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; color: navy;">Please explain. Your mail to others does
not AFAICT address the specific point I make here: if you revise a variant
subtag by adding additional prefixes, we have no means to document what the
denotation of some given prefix + variant combination is. </span></font></p>
<p><font color="navy" face="Arial" size="2"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; color: navy;"> </span></font></p>
<p><font color="navy" face="Arial" size="2"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; color: navy;">E.g. suppose the entry for a variant
subtag "western" were revised to include the prefix "en", and some people start
using it to denote some variety of English spoken in Cornwall while others
start using it to denote some variety of English spoken in Western Australia,
then there's a mess.</span></font></p>
<p><font color="navy" face="Arial" size="2"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; color: navy;"> </span></font></p>
<p><font color="navy" face="Arial" size="2"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; color: navy;"> </span></font></p>
<p><font color="navy" face="Arial" size="2"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; color: navy;">Peter</span></font></p>
<p><font color="navy" face="Arial" size="2"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; color: navy;"> </span></font></p>
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<p><b><font face="Tahoma" size="2"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Tahoma; font-weight: bold;">From:</span></font></b><font face="Tahoma" size="2"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Tahoma;">
<a href="mailto:mark.edward.davis@gmail.com" target="_blank" onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)">mark.edward.davis@gmail.com</a> [mailto:<a href="mailto:mark.edward.davis@gmail.com" target="_blank" onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)">
mark.edward.davis@gmail.com</a>] <b><span style="font-weight: bold;">On Behalf Of </span></b>Mark Davis<br>
<b><span style="font-weight: bold;">Sent:</span></b> Tuesday, August 29, 2006
5:02 PM<br>
<b><span style="font-weight: bold;">To:</span></b> Peter Constable</span></font></p></div><div><span class="q"><font face="Tahoma" size="2"><br>
<b><span style="font-weight: bold;">Cc:</span></b> IETF Languages Discussion<br>
<b><span style="font-weight: bold;">Subject:</span></b> Re: Request for variant
subtag: western</font></span></div><div><p></p>
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<p><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"> </span></font></p></div><div><span class="e" id="q_10d5cb9f9d51c207_3">
<p style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">That's based on a
mistaken assumption (see my mail to others). Mark</span></font></p>
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<p><span><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">On 8/29/06, <b><span style="font-weight: bold;">Peter
Constable</span></b> <<a href="mailto:petercon@microsoft.com" target="_blank" onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)">petercon@microsoft.com
</a>> wrote:</span></font></span></p>
<p><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">> From: John Cowan [mailto:<a href="mailto:cowan@ccil.org" target="_blank" onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)">cowan@ccil.org
</a>]<br>
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> As for hy-hyewest, I think it's awful.<br>
<br>
While it may look aweful, an advantage of this is that we can document
precisely what is meant by "hyewest" (or whatever form of subtag one
might want) -- that is, it is the Armeanian variety spoken by the Armenian
diaspora. <br>
<br>
But there is no way we can document how "western" ought to be
interpreted in all of the combinations it is used (unless we want to allow
multiple "western" variant entries, one for each prefix to be
documented). <br>
<br>
And going back to a paper Gary Simons and I wrote back in 2000, documenting
what tags are meant to denote is important. It won't help anybody if people
start using "foo-western" but there are widely differing opinions as
to what that refers to. <br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
Peter Constable<br>
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