From: Doug Ewell (dewell@adelphia.net)
Date: Sat Jul 12 2003 - 12:39:39 EDT
Philippe Verdy <verdy_p at wanadoo dot fr> wrote:
> I was sure also that "iw" was not used today, until I found that it is
> still used in Java on Windows, for legacy reasons... Creating a
> resource bundle in Hebrew with the code "he" was simply... ignored. So
> I had to rename it to "iw".
>
> Shamely, on Linux or various Unixes the correct code to use for
> locales varies, and it comes from the user-environment settings,
> actually setup by a system profile, most of the time... Users that
> want to get the benefit of existing locales for Hebrew will constantly
> need to change between "he" and 'iw". The "normal" installation
> solution is still today to create a file link between "he" and "iw"
> resources, so that they both can be used.
I agree that individual vendors have been known to ignore newly assigned
or changed codes, and even to encourage the continued use of deprecated
codes in the name of compatibility.
What I don't agree with is that this is somehow a fault or shortcoming
with the ISO 639 standard, unless you believe that codes should never be
changed.
Of course, if this is your belief, you are not alone. The ISO 3166
Maintenance Agency has now spent five months debating and voting on the
question of what new codes for "Serbia and Montenegro" should replace
"YU" and "YUG" used for "Yugoslavia," while some people wonder why the
codes have to be changed at all, if the country itself has not changed
but merely its name.
-Doug Ewell
Fullerton, California
http://users.adelphia.net/~dewell/
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