Timetable for action: May 31 is suggested

Michael Everson everson at evertype.com
Wed May 28 02:38:10 CEST 2003


At 11:40 -0400 2003-05-27, Tex Texin wrote:

>b) By describing an alternative and especially, the deprecations that would
>occur, John outlined a pretty good reason for going slow. Creating and
>deprecating codes would be very expensive to the software industry, and make a
>right mess for years. Having lived so may years without scripts in language
>codes, another year wouldn't kill us, if it meant getting a permanent and
>well-defined solution.

Exactly.

>d) To my mind, the fact that es-americas was not accepted is indicative of why
>the current approach is faulty and a new framework should be adopted.
>Michael made clear that the registry is about providing tags for languages,
>and only by determining that a language exists and needs a tag according to
>LINGUISTIC standards, would a tag be granted. The software industry has needs
>that do not align with linguistic standards, es-americas being one of them.
>Therefore the software industry should ideally have a separate tag registry
>(and/or production rules) that is aligned with software requirements.

That might very well be true.

>e) wedging scripts into languages is kind of a hack. Having it will help some
>applications and likely be confusing for others.

Indeed. Though it is likely necessary, if companies like IBM are 
locked into a language-tag structure.

>g) To my mind, the best solution would be to identify the principles that
>would work for the software industry and create a new framework. Given that
>that isn't going to happen, this discussion could take a few more weeks
>without incurring major harm to the industry and the proponents could be a bit
>more patient.

That would be my view.

>At the same time, there perhaps shouldn't be delay for delays
>sake, and if there are legitimate objections to consider, they need to be
>articulated. If it will take time to formulate those objections, we perhaps
>need an estimate of how long it would take. So for example, and not to put
>words in his mouth, if Michael or others need time to consider the proposal
>and the 2 week schedule is not sufficient, it would not be unreasonable to say
>this issue will take n weeks, to give time to all parties to respond.
>At least then, the clamoring for appeal etc. might die down and we could just
>focus on the proposal, knowing at the end of the period a decision would
>result.

Could a consensus be reached by the middle of June?
-- 
Michael Everson * * Everson Typography *  * http://www.evertype.com


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