On Nov 10, 2004, at 5:05 AM, Pochung(Pektiong) Chen(Tan) wrote:
The Norwegian language code problem might get a better solution using ISO 639-3. ISO 639-3 is not out yet, but it seems to be getting there. Here is the url to the draft http://scripts.sil.org/cms/scripts/render_download.php? site_id=nrsi&format=file&media_id=ISO_DIS_639 -3.5&filename=ISO_DIS_639-3.5.pdf
In ISO 639-3 we will have nor= {nob, nno}, Norweigian (so called macrolanguage code) nob= Norweigian Bokmal nno= Norweigian Nynorsk
This doesn't really provide anything that ISO 639-1 doesn't already in no, nb, nn.
Another macrolanguage example is the Serbo-Croation hbs= {bos, hrv,srp}, Serbo-Croatian bos= Bosnian hrv= Croatian srp= Serbian
ISO 639-1 sh, bs, hr, sr. (Technically the sh code has been retired.)
-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)