Subject: [Ltru] Conference on Language Standards

From: Tex Texin <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 11 Oct 2005 23:14:13 -0700

Hi, This will be of interest to you all. There is a conference devoted to
language standards in Berlin in December.
A number of different standards are covered. There will also be panel
discussions and in fact I am moderating a panel as well.

So I would like to extend a cordial invitation to you all to attend.

In addition, (although I am not sure how the timing compares with the
release of 3066bis, the registry etc.) if there is interest in having a
face-to-face meeting of this working group's participants, I have already
asked the organizers and they are happy to provide a room for the WG to meet
and progress the standard. The agenda of the meeting, just to be clear,
would not be mine or the organizers, but would be up to the WG to define and
act on.

I thought this would be a good way to encourage your participation in the
conference, to advance the work of the group, to give you a chance to meet
with some of the other standards committee's members, learn of their
activities and to promote what you are developing to some of these groups.

Regardless of whether you want to meet as a working group, you are each
still welcome to attend the conference.

The web site is here:
http://www.internationalization-conference.org/languagestandards/index.html

The agenda is online, as well as registration info, etc.
http://www.internationalization-conference.org/languagestandards/agenda.html

If you would like to have a WG meeting, then let me know and we will arrange
the facilities. The conference is Dec. 12-13, which is a Monday and Tuesday.

I have room to add a panelist representing rfc 3066bis, if one of you would
like to speak to the current plans and state of the art. To include you, I
would need to know right away though.

Tex

_______________________________________________
Ltru mailing list
[email-masked]
https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ltru

---

From: "Scott Hollenbeck" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 12 Oct 2005 08:22:10 -0400

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Tex Texin [mailto:[email-masked]] 
> Sent: Wednesday, October 12, 2005 2:14 AM
> To: LTRU WG
> Subject: [Ltru] Conference on Language Standards

[snip]

> would not be mine or the organizers, but would be up to the 

Please remember that the IETF has rules that must be followed to hold
interim working group meetings.  See section 3 of RFC 2418 for details.
There's nothing stopping anyone from getting togther informally, of course.

-Scott-

---

From: Tex Texin <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 12 Oct 2005 05:53:12 -0700

Informal's fine, I'll buy the donuts.
;-)
tex

-- 
-------------------------------------------------------------
Tex Texin   cell: +1 781 789 1898   mailto:[email-masked]
Xen Master                          http://www.i18nGuy.com
                         
XenCraft		            http://www.XenCraft.com
Making e-Business Work Around the World
-------------------------------------------------------------

---

From: r&d afrac <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 12 Oct 2005 14:45:26 +0200

>There's nothing stopping anyone from getting togther informally, of course.

Even in Versailles :-) ?

Tex,
I note that I hold a workshop in Paris on that theme, in July. I paid 
for the travel and possibly the accomodation of the panelists I 
invited. Do you think you could do the same? It would certainly help. 
Or is it purely commercial?
Anyway we have an Eurolinc BoD Meeting this AM: I will extend them 
your invitation and pass it to the MINC BoD and send it on the NICSO 
Broadcast. But please note that the date is between Tunis and Xmas, 
so you may not get all the "governance" attendance you might want.
Will you publish the minutes of the meeting?
jfc

PS. I found on the site some thinkings I think of interest to 
understand people in our area

"Good standards can drive industries and grow markets. This summit 
will focus on the technology and business needs that benefit from standards."
Donald A. DePalma
Common Sense Advisory, Inc.

-> the problem of this WG: we did not ask ourselves what is a "good" 
standard. We constrained an existing one to reduce its leaks.

"Many constituencies in our industry are developing standards 
independently of one another, sometimes even competing ones. It's 
time to bring the standards efforts together so we can all benefit 
from the value that good, universally accepted standards provide."
Hans Fenstermacher
President, ArchiText®

-> full agreement. I whish him luck.

"We need to promote the maintenance and development of standards with 
the help of all constituencies, standards that all constituencies 
will uphold because they were involved in their development."
Kim Harris
Partner, text & form

-> the only solution. Not yet ours however.

"Most companies assume that standards addressing language 
technologies and quality are the 'right stuff'. Standards are usually 
designed by experts to meet known industry needs. But these standards 
do not fit all potential uses. We have long needed a dialogue on 
language standards to help people make distinctions. This summit is 
the first time that this is being offered."
Tex Texin
Chief architect and globalization consultant, Xencraft

-> the WG-ltru could have been this first time. The network is the 
core of the human life in our century. Networked is now more 
important than spoken and writen in languages. The current Unicode 
lead thinking shows some progress from hardware to software, but not 
yet to brainware. There is a commercial objection to that IAB well 
describe in RFC 3869. As long as we do not overcome it, languages 
will not be link between people but a weapon.

This "http://newsfromrussia.com/world/2005/10/06/64579.html" stays 
the best evaluation I saw for a long. A response given by Mark Davis 
yesterday on [email-masked], shows the difference in the words 
used, and in the supported concepts, and therefore possibly targeted 
objectives. When people are talking souls, cultures, relations, jobs, 
development ... our role is to support and permit developers to serve them,

<quote>
"1. A localized product is one that is adapted to meet the language, 
cultural and other requirements of a specific target market (a "locale")."
"2. An internationalized software product is one that can be 
localized to any single locale without code changes."
"3. A globalized software product is one that is internationalized, 
and also supports multiple data locales at runtime. It may also 
support a runtime choice among UI locales."
<unquote>

is technically correct, but so "bleak" because limited. Weapons are bleak.

It is always dangerous to play with weapons.

Do you really want the IETF to politically side with this? I would be 
proud to be banned if they did.

---

From: "Randy Presuhn" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 12 Oct 2005 11:10:18 -0700

Hi -

> From: "Tex Texin" <[email-masked]>
> To: "Scott Hollenbeck" <[email-masked]>
> Cc: "'LTRU WG'" <[email-masked]>
> Sent: Wednesday, October 12, 2005 5:53 AM
> Subject: Re: [Ltru] Conference on Language Standards
>
...

Thanks for the generous offer, as qualified by our AD.

By December I would hope that this WG would be history, so
such a gathering would clearly be informal.  (Unless, after completing
the matching work, the WG agrees to request additions to its charter
and the IESG is willing to extend it.)

If we are to finish according to current schedule, the matching
draft will need to have WG last call in its current form, or an
update submitted by Monday October 17th.  Clocks are ticking.

Randy

---

From: "John.Cowan" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 12 Oct 2005 15:05:40 -0400

> and the IESG is willing to extend it.)

I would push quite strongly for dormancy rather than termination;
when ISO 639-3 completes the FDIS stage, we will need to do the
work on RFC 3066ter.  Hopefully this will be a much simpler change,
as all the ground work has been laid.  I see that as preferable
to rechartering LTRU with a very similar charter next year.

-- 
It was dreary and wearisome.  Cold clammy winter still held way in this
forsaken country.  The only green was the scum of livid weed on the dark
greasy surfaces of the sullen waters.  Dead grasses and rotting reeds loomed
up in the mists like ragged shadows of long-forgotten summers.
        --"The Passage of the Marshes"          http://www.ccil.org/~cowan

---

From: r&d afrac <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 12 Oct 2005 21:20:51 +0200

At 21:05 12/10/2005, John.Cowan wrote:
>I see that as preferable to rechartering LTRU with a very similar 
>charter next year.

The best interest of the IETF, SSDOs and Internet users is certainly 
to have this WG closed.
And a WG-globalisation created with a new preparation round and a 
Charter preventing political siding.
jfc

---

From: Tex Texin <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 12 Oct 2005 23:38:13 -0700

Sorry, there isn't a budget to fund travel or accommodation.

I won't commit to publishing minutes as coming just before the holidays I am
going to be busy on several fronts. But I will keep it in mind and it is my
intention to do so.

As for your last question about the IETF taking sides, I am not sure where
that is coming from.
Neither I nor the conference requested anything of IETF.

tex

r&d afrac wrote:
> I note that I hold a workshop in Paris on that theme, in July. I paid for
> the travel and possibly the accomodation of the panelists I invited. Do
> you think you could do the same? It would certainly help. Or is it purely
> commercial?
> Anyway we have an Eurolinc BoD Meeting this AM: I will extend them your
> invitation and pass it to the MINC BoD and send it on the NICSO Broadcast.
> But please note that the date is between Tunis and Xmas, so you may not
> get all the "governance" attendance you might want.
> PS. I found on the site some thinkings I think of interest to understand
> people in our area
> 
> "Good standards can drive industries and grow markets. This summit will
> focus on the technology and business needs that benefit from standards."
> Donald A. DePalma
> independently of one another, sometimes even competing ones. It's time to
> bring the standards efforts together so we can all benefit from the value
> that good, universally accepted standards provide."
> Hans Fenstermacher
> President, ArchiText®
> 
> "We need to promote the maintenance and development of standards with the
> help of all constituencies, standards that all constituencies will uphold
> because they were involved in their development."
> Kim Harris
> Partner, text & form
> 
> "Most companies assume that standards addressing language technologies and
> quality are the 'right stuff'. Standards are usually designed by experts
> to meet known industry needs. But these standards do not fit all potential
> uses. We have long needed a dialogue on language standards to help people
> make distinctions. This summit is the first time that this is being
> offered."
> Tex Texin
> -> the WG-ltru could have been this first time. The network is the core of
> the human life in our century. Networked is now more important than spoken
> and writen in languages. The current Unicode lead thinking shows some
> progress from hardware to software, but not yet to brainware. There is a
> commercial objection to that IAB well describe in RFC 3869. As long as we
> do not overcome it, languages will not be link between people but a
> weapon.
> 
> This " http://newsfromrussia.com/world/2005/10/06/64579.html" stays the
> best evaluation I saw for a long. A response given by Mark Davis yesterday
> on [email-masked], shows the difference in the words used, and in the
> supported concepts, and therefore possibly targeted objectives. When
> people are talking souls, cultures, relations, jobs, development ... our
> role is to support and permit developers to serve them,
> 
> <quote>
> "2. An internationalized software product is one that can be localized to
> any single locale without code changes."
> "3. A globalized software product is one that is internationalized, and
> also supports multiple data locales at runtime. It may also support a
> runtime choice among UI locales."
> <unquote>
>

---

From: Tex Texin <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 12 Oct 2005 23:43:36 -0700

In that event I'll put birthday candles in the donuts!

---

From: r&d afrac <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 13 Oct 2005 13:17:00 +0200

>Neither I nor the conference requested anything of IETF.

Dear Tex,
I am talking to you, not to the conference. You support this WG-ltru 
"consensus".

There are two ways of considering globalization (with "z" or with "s").

- globalization: end to end English/ASCII core based 
internationalisation + localizations.
- globalisation: end to end universalisation + open localisation + 
multilingualisation + vernacularised multiculturation

"z" comes with constraints, options and layer violations to support 
multilingual/vernacular/security constraints over mostly what is 
mostly written language end to end support (computer oriented). [if 
you remove the constraints, it is acceptable as a default for an 
English system/e-commerce document international support/translation].

"s" comes with the need of a big but necessary work on 
reference/context registry distribution (DRS). It opens the door to 
extended services to the relation (IETF/IAB approaches with OPES) and 
mostly considers networked languages new issues (the conference seems 
to do that in part, good!)

This conflict is technically the founding conflict (any other 
conflict and resolution needs a language to be discussed and a 
document to be settled) of the current more general conflict between 
the USA and the rest of the world (disregard the DNS issue, it is 
only a (poor) pretext).

This conflict is between:

- a closed commercial approach based upon constraint and a 10 year 
IETF culture by Harald Alvestrand. Some label its consequences as 
"shaping the world" or "war on culture".

- and an open standardisation JTC1/SC32/W2 effort based, still 
needing a lot of works and developments, but already usable, ISO 11179.

This WG decided against ISO 11179 conformance  with Peter Constable's 
approach of ISO 639-3. While Debbie Garside documented the ISO 639-6 
ISO 11179 conformance. It also disregarded AFRAC needs of full 
information interregistration (and MPA, MPEG, etc.). I fully 
understand the underlaying commercial interests. They shown they have 
fully understood the danger for them of my user QA, political 
objections and plea for open standards.

I proposed a compromise, but commercial interests need exclusive, 
even if it is an illusory one, on a sheet of paper.

Notwithstanding, the RFC 3066 bis is a sided political declaration. 
It supports a vision currently opposed by most of the world, and 
giving more importance to that opposition due to the importance it 
gives to ISO 3166. I am sure most in this WG do not intend it this 
way. But this is what  they permit. I suspect that if you listen 
carefully at what some of the Berlin attendees will say (as did the 
Paris, and the Versailles attendees and NICSO readers) you will hear 
something along this line. At least you will be prepared.

In any case this conference _is_ interesting. If you can produce 
notes on it, it would be _great_ for poorly Gov funded and non-profit 
organisations like us.

Take care.
jfc

---

From: Marion Gunn <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 13 Oct 2005 18:03:24 +0100

Scríobh r&d afrac:
>
> There are two ways of considering globalization (with "z" or with "s")
> ...

Au contraire - only one way per language: "z" for FR, "s" for EN.

> Take care.

Et vous aussi, et assez bien - tec'hed a ra ar Saoz penn-da-benn, pa
leveromp-ni: tor e benn!:-)
mg

-- 

Marion Gunn * EGTeo (Estab.1991)
27 Páirc an Fhéithlinn, Baile an 
Bhóthair, Co. Átha Cliath, Éire.
* [email-masked] * [email-masked] *

---

From: Marion Gunn <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 13 Oct 2005 18:35:48 +0100

Before anyone jumps on my lame attempt at humour: "contraire" is meant
to be read as en effet (in effect, functionally) reversing the phrase "
"z" for FR, "s" for EN" below. 

If too long a workday for some, please treat one another kindly.:-)
mg

--

---

From: "John.Cowan" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 13 Oct 2005 15:08:36 -0400

> Au contraire - only one way per language: "z" for FR, "s" for EN.

Um, well, no.  Not only is "z" correct for en-us, it is also correct for
en-gb-oed.

-- 
Dream projects long deferred            John Cowan <[email-masked]>
usually bite the wax tadpole.            http://www.ccil.org/~cowan
        --James Lileks                  http://www.reutershealth.com

---

From: "Debbie Garside" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 13 Oct 2005 22:16:26 +0100

> Um, well, no.  Not only is "z" correct for en-us, it is also correct for

IMHO, the OED editor must have had American roots when that was added ;-)

Both are correct according to OED.  Personally I think only "s" is correct
for en-gb.

Just for interest... I think this article is most relevant
http://www.britishcouncil.org/seminars-themes-education-0202.htm 

Debbie Garside

> From: [email-masked] [mailto:[email-masked]] On Behalf Of
> John.Cowan
> Sent: 13 October 2005 20:09
> To: Marion Gunn
> Cc: [email-masked]

---

From: "Randy Presuhn" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 13 Oct 2005 14:41:57 -0700

HI -

> From: "Debbie Garside" <[email-masked]>
> To: "'John.Cowan'" <[email-masked]>; "'Marion Gunn'" <[email-masked]>
> Cc: <[email-masked]>
> Sent: Thursday, October 13, 2005 2:16 PM
> Subject: RE: [Ltru] Conference on Language Standards
...
...

This article makes no mention of language tagging, or, more pertinent
to our current task at hand, algorithms for language tag matching.

PLEASE, let's return to the work at hand: we need to finish off the
 matching draft.  Frank and Kent have made substantative comments.
I suggest we resolve those comments and make sure we're ready
for WG last call on that document.

Randy, ltru co-chair

---

From: r&d afrac <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 13 Oct 2005 23:53:56 +0200

>Au contraire - only one way per language: "z" for FR, "s" for EN.

Non, "z" pour en-US, "s" pour le reste du monde.

>leveromp-ni: tor e benn!:-)

Thank you for your help.
God bless.
jfc

---

From: r&d afrac <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 14 Oct 2005 00:32:01 +0200

>http://www.britishcouncil.org/seminars-themes-education-0202.htm

This article is quite relevant, but it makes the same mistake as the 
IETF. So, I think the OED editor has American roots and the BC was 
not familiar with Eurospeak yet, or still British enough. The today 
IESG pro globalization position will probably help clarifying this 
now, in permitting to technically differentiate with globalisation.

Global has two meanings.
- in English, French, etc. it means all the parts of a whole, united, 
the globe diversity. Because we ran the Globe and found it diverse.
- in American it means universal, unified, "catholic" (in the old Greek sense).
For example a guy like José Bové is for globalisation against globalization.

Now, when you consider language filtering, as it is the case in here, 
you have a problem. Let just consider the simplest case: a menu with 
your languages + default. You can either (as documented by Addison) 
default to American (because you globalize, i.e. internationalise 
American + localise) or you can default to a more complex (and [non 
American] real life system) where the default is relative to the 
interlocutor and the language (then you globalise).

Let take an example. We start a chat. You send me your possible 
langtags. Because I know who you are (layer 6 violation) I will pick 
English, because I know you care. Now, if I start a chat with Randy 
(layer 6 violation) I will back to Spanish, because he was hurting 
enough with my Franglish and I know he lived in South of France, so 
he may have some practice.

So, English (and other Koines - American is the computer koine and an 
architectural Internet mistake [communications protocols are usually 
digital to be multilingual]) is like the Esope's tongue. The problem 
is the filtering policy and this policy depends on the limitations of 
the protocol it is to work with. The RFC 3066 bis protocol is far too 
rigid: so whatever the filtering you will use, it will lack the 
flexibility you might want. Mind you, the problem will be reduced, 
but will stay with ISO 639-6.

The real issue is to accept that networked languages are something 
apart or/and complementary from their spoken, written, signed, 
silent, multimedia modes. And that each time a different filtering 
policy/strategy can be used. And then to design the tools to support 
them (protocols, identifiers, filters, etc. etc. in a way matching 
their modal needs)

jfc

---

From: Frank Ellermann <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 14 Oct 2005 13:54:27 +0200

John.Cowan wrote:

> it is also correct for en-gb-oed.

That's why I like this tag.  Maybe the "z" issue
is also a reason for the abbreviation I18N.  Some
case of "while we don't agree how to spell it we
can still talk about it".  And (the word) I18N is
a part of (the problem) I18N.  No wonder that it
now also attracts folks with a math. background.

                        Bye, Frank

---

From: Frank Ellermann <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 14 Oct 2005 14:09:46 +0200

r&d afrac wrote:
 
> "z" pour en-US, "s" pour le reste du monde.

Not really, de-1996 has its own set of z-rules
(the former "potentiell" is now "potenziell").

This isn't about the "rest of the world", but
only about some remains of the Roman Empire.

                Take care, Frank

---

From: r&d afrac <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 14 Oct 2005 15:02:13 +0200

>only about some remains of the Roman Empire.

Then the Roman Empire does well !!!  May be you thought "old Europe"?

As long as I know Germany backs the European position presented by a 
British delegate. It teams India, China, Russia, Brazil, Arabic 
world, etc.  Times flows, "globalization" is just the current avatar 
of "kulturkampf".... The same causes lead to the same effects ...

But here we discuss filtering.

FYI an interestingly considered Government note I just have heard of 
after IESG 10/13 position: "to filter out" every content including 
cultural, racial, religious non crypted information not formaly 
accepted by the receiver, interruption of the access to search 
engines permitting to obtain lists of content including destinees or 
authors by cultural, racial, religious general tags or distinctive 
patterns, supporting an easy identification of the subtags and 
documented filtering algorithms.

They look for a short name for the "spaming" of a person with her own 
private data in the content/protocols she receives. I was asked if 
the WG-ltru forged a name to qualify this use of RFC 3066 bis. I said 
that I was not aware of one? It was suggested "to mark" as a tribute 
to Mark Davis.

jfc

---

From: Tex Texin <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 14 Oct 2005 19:57:38 -0700

I am surprised, I thought you weren't accepting further substantive
comments...

I was going to submit some, but held back.
Where is this exactly and do you prefer them now or during last call?
tex

---

From: "Randy Presuhn" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 14 Oct 2005 21:47:33 -0700

Hi -

> To: "Randy Presuhn" <[email-masked]>
> Cc: <[email-masked]>
> Sent: Friday, October 14, 2005 7:57 PM
...

The only remaining work item for the ltru working group is the matching
draft. http://www.ietf.org/internet-drafts/draft-ietf-ltru-matching-05.txt

Comments are most welcome, sooner rather than later.

Randy

---

From: Marion Gunn <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 15 Oct 2005 12:56:51 +0100

Which just goes to prove what a very good thing it was that I sent out
my second msg (lest more than just the usual - um - Johns failed to
grasp the humour/spirit of my first).
mg

--

---

From: Marion Gunn <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 15 Oct 2005 13:02:40 +0100

Dear Debbie,

I little expected my little in-joke to reveal such a difference between
the two of us.:-)

ISO's very own official EN and FR titles set the spelling rule for
worldwide standards as Z in EN, S in FR.

This we must accept and abide by.
mg

--