Subject: RE: [Ltru] Re: XML registries now available

From: "McDonald, Ira" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 27 Mar 2005 12:04:44 -0800

Hi,

I am _not_ opposed to an XML registry for language tags.

I'm opposed to _only_ an XML registry.  I liked the option (4)
a while back on this list with both:

(a) Normative record-jar format in straight 7-bit ASCII
(b) Informative XML for ease-of-use by some automata

Separately, the discussion about how small a device (e.g.,
PDA or cellphone) needs to cache the registry is flawed.

No software should EVER download the registry from IANA in
a running device - this is a denial-of-service nightmare.
Software that downloaded newer language tags wouldn't know
what to do with them anyway.

Cheers,
- Ira

Ira McDonald (Musician / Software Architect)
Blue Roof Music / High North Inc
PO Box 221  Grand Marais, MI  49839
phone: +1-906-494-2434
email: [email-masked]

_______________________________________________
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From: John Cowan <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 27 Mar 2005 16:49:39 -0500

> what to do with them anyway.

This point deserves to be written up somewhere in letters of gold.
It is why there is absolutely no comparison between the LTR and the DNS.

-- 
John Cowan  [email-masked]  www.reutershealth.com  www.ccil.org/~cowan
[R]eversing the apostolic precept to be all things to all men, I usually [before
Darwin] defended the tenability of the received doctrines, when I had to do
with the [evolution]ists; and stood up for the possibility of [evolution] among
the orthodox -- thereby, no doubt, increasing an already current, but quite
undeserved, reputation for needless combativeness.  --T. H. Huxley

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From: Frank Ellermann <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 28 Mar 2005 00:14:11 +0200

> what to do with them anyway.

What I had in mind was the configuration of "accept-languages"
with my browser:  It came with a huge list of choices, and it
offered to add other values manually.  The relevant part for
"small devices" is the "huge list" - not dowloaded from IANA
for each device, built-in, but you'd need that ROM.  No idea
how it's today, but a decade ago EPROM / EEPROM / etc. were
quite expensive in relation to the complete costs.  Bye, Frank

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From: "JFC (Jefsey) Morfin" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 28 Mar 2005 13:43:47 +0200

>It is why there is absolutely no comparison between the LTR and the DNS.

I do not understand this. Could you document that?

I assume you consider the situation where:
1. the application gets a langtag
2. consider what do to with it.
3. there are three possible solutions?
     - it knows the langtag from it being built-in.
     - it does not know it but it has a filtering/negociation strategy 
built-in or based upon non IANA parameters
     - all this fails and its filtering/negociation strategy resort to a 
IANA input before concluding?

I would say this is similar to anti-spam or to anti-virus strategies. 
Obviously codes change les frequently than spamming hosts and viruses, but 
the simple fact they change make the load similar (the load is not because 
there are a lot of changes, but because there is a check if nothing changed).

What do I suppose wrong according you?
Thanks.
jfc

>--
>John 
>Cowan  [email-masked]  www.reutershealth.com  www.ccil.org/~cowan

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From: "JFC (Jefsey) Morfin" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 28 Mar 2005 13:07:02 +0200

>quite expensive in relation to the complete costs.  Bye, Frank

Frank,
this reasoning is the same as for DNS. First they started with Hosts.txt 
[an IP address/name table] everyone had to maintain on their computer. Then 
the update went too heavy (actually this is not the updating, but the check 
if there is something to be updated). The DNS permitted only the necessary 
data to be inquired and updated. A good entry is cached until it is wrong.

This experience is good for us with some considerations:

1. PADs (private alias directories) will soon emerge as IPv6 and 
Multilingualism develop, IETF and ICANN do not want/are unable to address. 
A PAD can be a list of IP address and names in English in a Hosts.eng file 
and the same list with names in Breton in file Hosts.bre. To change your 
computer from an English Internet box to a Breton one you just copy 
Hosts.bre into Hosts.txt and can use Breton URLs all right.

2. The way ICANN and IETF consider the root is obviously a joke - the 
entire world real time relying religiously on a file IANA takes up to years 
to update from public data, to the point to two computers in the same room 
cannot dialog together if they lose connectivity to the root system for 
longer than a TTL - but in the langtags we can decide :

1) TTL (time to live) for the langtag to be kept in "cache" - in the 
langtags.txt file on your computer - is the current year + a random 0/365 
value. This means that when your entry is older than maximum 729 days you 
should update your langtags.txt file (the random figure to avoid everyone 
call the IANA or mirrors the same day).

2) the structure of expired code is entered in the langtags.txt file as 
code + current year plus description. When it is reassigned description 
change and a new code+year is entered. So if the obsolescence cycle of a 
code is 20 years, another is 10 years, another 50 years, you do not mind. I 
you know the date of the file the langtag comes from you perfectly know 
what it relates to.

In the case of small devices, like a multilingual translator, etc. you just 
copy the langtags.txt file on a flash memory as you suggest.

Obviously when I talk of langtags.txt this is a generic name you can 
decline in using ISO 639 code to have them in every language you want, 
langtags.eng, langtags.bre etc....

jfc

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From: John Cowan <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 28 Mar 2005 12:29:34 -0500

> IANA input before concluding?

In practice, the second and third strategies are a matter of using a
matching algorithm (which need not be standardized and can rely on local
knowledge as well) to reduce the unknown langtag to a known one.  With an
absolutely unknown langtag, nothing useful can be done except to display
the full name of the language, which is useful but not very useful.
Without translators, spelling checkers, and other such tools, one can
do little with such a document.

This is quite different from the DNS case, where given the mapping of
a computer's name to an IP address, one can indeed interact with that
computer in useful ways.  If I know how to reach newmachine.somedomain.fi,
I can try to discover what resources it provides.  If I receive a document
langtagged "sms", the most I could do with it is label it "Skolt Sami".

> I would say this is similar to anti-spam or to anti-virus strategies. 

Languages aren't constantly being created: on the contrary, they are
constantly going extinct.  The list of living languages will probably
shrink by 90% over the next century or two.

> there are a lot of changes, but because there is a check if nothing 

In practice this table will probably be updated only when the operating system is.

-- 
John Cowan  [email-masked]  www.reutershealth.com  www.ccil.org/~cowan
Big as a house, much bigger than a house, it looked to [Sam], a grey-clad
moving hill.  Fear and wonder, maybe, enlarged him in the hobbit's eyes,
but the Mumak of Harad was indeed a beast of vast bulk, and the like of him
does not walk now in Middle-earth; his kin that live still in latter days are
but memories of his girth and his majesty.  --"Of Herbs and Stewed Rabbit"

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From: "JFC (Jefsey) Morfin" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 28 Mar 2005 23:58:44 +0200

>do little with such a document.

Yeap. But the first and second strategy has no big load on the IANA.
The first point is to know if the langtag is registered. Then to know its 
environment. With the maximum of speed and the lowest load for the database 
system. The rest is a matter of other services as you say.

>langtagged "sms", the most I could do with it is label it "Skolt Sami".

I do not quote the DNS as a way to reach an IP (what can also be the use 
for). The IP address given by the DNS is just an information as another. 
The DNS is first a distributed database system, which can easily supports a 
billion of information at low load and low cost. With a distributed 
management system.

>Languages aren't constantly being created:

In term of load, the problem is the same. What motivates a query is the 
change. Whatever it is. Actually this is not totally true: the number of 
_documented_languages_ is going to increase.

>on the contrary, they are

Who knows? The change over the last 50 years when a cultural development 
policy is engaged is not necessarily that way. The debate I follow right 
now is for example to know if a regional language (Occitan) is to be 
registered as one (as today in the 639-3 draft) or as six languages.

I see young kids in my family having more Breton than French. 20 years ago 
it was unthinkable. IMHO, Multilingual Internet MAY (I mean nothing more) 
lead to a change in the current trend. We start having statistics (it will 
still take time to have significant results in number of people and in 
number of languages and cultures). They seem to show that bilingual people 
have a slightly higher IQ and that "apparent IQ" (when you test the same 
person's IQ in different languages) is lower in English (common language) 
than in their mother tongue.

>In practice this table will probably be updated only when the operating 

Probably yes, and this is in line with/below the figures I gave. Question 
is from where: from the OS CD or from IANA?
jfc