Re: core components analysis

["William J. Kammerer" <wkammerer@foresightcorp.com>]

Duane Nickull wrote that he "also saw ISO 639-2/T (qaa-qtz) under 'R'
entitled 'reserved for local use'.  Does this purport to be some kind of
localized extensibility mechanism for the language definition codes?"
See ISO 639-2, Codes for the Representation of Names of Languages, at
http://lcweb.loc.gov/standards/iso639-2/englangn.html.

Dear Duane:

What do I look like?  The answer man?  In this case I'll cut you some
slack.  Take a look at the paper "ISO 639-1 and ISO 639-2: International
Standards for Language Codes. ISO 15924: International Standard for
names of scripts," by John D. Byrum of the Library of Congress, at
http://www.ifla.org/IV/ifla65/papers/099-155e.htm.  He says:

   ISO 639-2 recognizes that in some cases agencies will want to
   provide codes for dialects which are not present in the
   standard; thus, the codes qaa through qtx have been reserved
   for local use. Another case where local codes might be wanted
   would be to provide codes for those ancient languages which
   in ISO 639-2 do not have their own codes. But the standard
   warns that records with codes assigned from those reserved
   for local use should not be exchanged internationally, as the
   local codes will differ from institution to institution.

Codes qaa through qtx will probably not have any usage in e-business.

Even though you "would never envision someone using an obscure dialect
like Mi'kmaq to conduct electronic business in the 21st century,"
please consider that English was once an obscure dialect of German, and
on the verge of extinction only a few generations after William
conquered England in 1066.  The language of court and custom was French,
imported by the Normans. Henry II, a century after William, could barely
understand English any better than I understand Flemish.  English,
creolized with a French veneer, recovered by the time of the Tudors - to
burst forth with Elizabethan fury on the New World following Sir Walter
Raleigh's defeat of the Spanish Armada.

Maybe we'll hear some more from the Mi'kmaq.

William J. Kammerer
FORESIGHT Corp.
4950 Blazer Memorial Pkwy.
Dublin, OH USA 43017-3305
+1 614 791-1600

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