Status of recent proposals

[Peter Constable]

From: ietf-languages-bounces at alvestrand.no [mailto:ietf-languages-bounces at alvestrand.no] On Behalf Of Michael Everson

> http://wo.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolof_(làkk) doesn't mention Arabic

Michael, review WG2 docs this week, specifically one from Lorna Priest requesting new Arabic characters: it requests new characters used in Wolof orthographies and cites Ministry of Education materials.


> In any case the whole suppress-script thing is supposed to be quantitative, 

It's not simply quantitative because it's really hard to determine the specific percentage with which a script is used for a given language, and even if we could there's no objective threshold for saying when to use / when not to use s-s.

Rather, s-s was intended for cases like English (say) in which there is _only one script_ used in conventional orthographies, and we know that to be the case. Whenever there are conventional orthographies in more than one script, or in any case in which we're not sure if whether or not there are conventional orthographies in more than one script, then we should not be using s-s--that's what was intended when it was added to BCP47.


> and evidence for quickly accepting the request is wanting. 

Based on the intended usage (and non-usage) for s-s, I don't need a lot of evidence: even a reasonable doubt as to whether there are conventional orthographies in more than one script should be sufficient to rule out s-s.



> If the requester can substantiate his claim, he can make another request.

I have substantiated my claim: I have cited Senegal Ministry of Education documents that document their sanctioning and standardization of an Arabic-script orthography for Wolof. You can all read about it yourself and see attestation samples in http://www.dkuug.dk/JTC1/SC2/WG2/docs/n3882.pdf (section 6.2 and associated figures); you can find the references in the bibliography, including a Ministry of Education (DPLN) publication with an Arabic-script title which is described in English as "Teaching Manual in Wolof" (that might be a description of the work rather than a translation of the title).

I shouldn't have to make another request, but consider the request made. 



Peter