Everyone is Ukrainian

The RISC OS model of Countries, Alphabets, Keyboards and Territories is outdated, ambiguous, neglected and broken. Needs to be taken out and shot (by which I mean maintained for compatibility reasons but fixed with a new one).

As a half-hearted attempt to begin to change things, Service_International gained reason code 9 – Convert Country Number to ISO 3166-1 Code. It’s not much used.

Unfortunately, whoever did this didn’t look very closely at ISO 3316 3166-1, because the UK territory (et al) returns “uk”… which isn’t UK. “gb” is UK (do pay attention at the back). “uk” is reserved in ISO 3316-1, but the other pertinent reference is the IANA language/region/script registry which combines ISO 3316-1 with other standards. There, “uk” is definitely the language tag for “Ukrainian”.

InternationalKeyboard should not be reporting GB as Ukrainian. Щасливого Великодня!

For getting country and their codes I’ve found a web site where you can download a JSON file of it.

http://country.io/data/

I think most people will understand ‘uk’ as meaning United Kingdom. Don’t worry about trivia!

I couldn’t give a monkeys what “most people” think. International standards are international standards. This isn’t about people understanding, it’s about interoperability of software systems.

But since you’re familiar with all the pertinent standards can I leave it to you to inform the British Government that they’ve got it wrong ?

Unfortunately, whoever did this didn’t look very closely at ISO 3316-1, because the UK territory (et al) returns “uk”… which isn’t UK. “

I think you have used too many words there and you may well find that whoever did it didn’t look at ISO 3166-1.

BTW. You might want to edit to change the 3316-1 entries as that refers to Assembly tools for screws and nuts although that might be applicable round here.

The key phrase on my passport is “United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland”. The UK (in British terms) is not the same as Great Britain.

Needs to be taken out and shot

Hear hear.

didn’t look very closely at ISO 3316-1

I don’t know about you, but my StrongHelp file says it’s ISO 3166:1 alpha 2, and there the official country code for Britain is “gb”, with “uk” being exceptionally reserved.

I couldn’t give a monkeys what “most people” think.

Uhhh…. you might have noted that while the three character code for Ukraine is UKR, the two character is UA and it was allocated in 1974… perhaps due to the UK using UK instead of GB (which is its real allocation).

can I leave it to you to inform the British Government that they’ve got it wrong ?

That document lists Ukraine as UA, UKR, and 804.
The problem with the document is that while GB is the official country code, UK is heavily used – indeed I don’t think it’s actually currently possible to register a .gb domain. It’s something-dot-uk (or in some cases uk.org and the like, just to hammer home that “uk” is the name associated with Britain, not Ukraine!). So the linked document calls Ukraine UA, Britain GB, and says nothing at all about UK.

As for the call returning UK in preference to the technically correct GB, it’s clearly noted in the documentation: The UK uses ‘uk’ in preference to its allocated ‘gb’ abbreviation.

There, “uk” is definitely the language tag for “Ukrainian”.

Language tag is irrelevant. The language I’m speaking is “en”. If you want to shoehorn in some sort of British reference, then specifically it is “en-GB”¹, but however you look at it, names of languages are not necessarily names of countries.
The ServiceCall returns the country name. It should return GB but it actually returns UK, as is noted. It should probably find a way to return both. But at any rate, no, we’re not Ukrainian.

¹ Even more specifically, en-GB with a semi-north-Hampshire, semi-posh-git, semi-midat accent. I believe the tag for that is “en-GB-wtf”.

The key phrase on my passport is “United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland”.

The key phrase on my passport is “European Union”.

Steve said

I think you have used too many words there

If I’m Rimmer quoting a Space Corps Directive, that makes you Kryten.

Dave said

<something irrelevant>

Rick nearly paid attention until

you might have noted that while the three character code for Ukraine is UKR

Whereas I clearly wrote

There, “uk” is definitely the language tag for “Ukrainian”.

Which it is.

I don’t think it’s actually currently possible to register a .gb domain

Irrelevant – that’s a different… domain. (see what I did there)

however you look at it, names of languages are not necessarily names of countries

Indeed, and I’m working towards a system where both will be relevant, so we can’t have half of it being wrong just because of what somebody thinks it says on their passport…

See keyboard thread elsewhere.

Rick nearly paid attention until

I don’t think I’m the one failing to pay attention…

Which it is.

Oh, I don’t disagree. “uk” is indeed the language tag for Ukrainian.

However the Service Call that you’re upset about returns country codes. And while it probably ought to return “gb” for country #1, it returns “uk” which is an allocated and in-use alias for the United Kingdom.
ISO 3166-1 is concerted with COUNTRY codes. It is different to language codes, which are defined in ISO 639 (where “uk” is, as you said, “Ukraine”).
Please don’t confuse these. They’re not the same thing.

Rick, I’m not at all confused.

“Country codes” are not country codes. They’re sometimes language codes, and sometimes something else entirely. The associated country names have often been used for internationalisation. Fortunately, I don’t think anyone has yet used the ISO codes for that purpose, but it is important to ensure that this is fixed before anyone does in good faith.

I have proposed that the IANA LSR codes be used for internationalisation, language preference, keyboard selection etc, to get away from the ambiguity baked into the “Country” codes. This will involve using the correct kind of code in the correct place, BUT, for compatibility one will need to cope with existing usage.

Please don’t confuse these. They’re not the same thing.

Please re-read what I actually wrote:

the other pertinent reference is the IANA language/region/script registry which combines ISO 3166-1 with other standards. There, “uk” is definitely the language tag for “Ukrainian”.

Can you see that I am not confused about which standard is which? Can you see that I am specifying exactly which standard I will be employing?

You cannot invoke (misplaced) pedantry over the exact standard being referred to, and then ignore the fact that it is that standard that the code is not compliant with. The fact that somebody wrote a comment in a source file does not excuse the misuse (KB I presume).

So far I’ve not read one reason why the code should not be corrected. Is there a reason, or are we in the realms of veneration of the ancients?

I’m going to give up here, for two reasons.

Firstly, UK is “exceptionally allocated” to Britain in ISO 3166-1, and it is UKrainain in ISO 639. This is fact. I would imagine that there is some method of dealing with this (I note that language specifiers are language-country (en-GB, fr-CA, etc). So maybe it’s just a matter of accepting “uk” on the left, not the right?

Secondly, and more importantly… I don’t actually care. Until you raised the issue, I wasn’t even aware that such a ServiceCall existed… My only involvement is to point out that the call, as defined in the API, returns “uk” (country code) where UK is not Ukrainian (language code). ;-)

So far I’ve not read one reason why the code should not be corrected. Is there a reason,

The (somewhat tenuous) reason, given as a comment in the code, is that the UK uses UK and not GB.

Funny. I could have sworn that British English was en-GB!

I’d suggest filing it as a bug and getting it changed to GB in the nightly beta and see if anything breaks (and if so, why it is relying on an unusual response).

I’ll even make it really easy – it’s here: https://www.riscosopen.org/viewer/view/apache/RiscOS/Sources/Internat/Inter/s/InterBody?rev=4.22#l1307

If I’m Rimmer quoting a Space Corps Directive, that makes you Kryten

Irritating but amusing pedant with few friends and zero social life? Sometimes given to self deprecation. Yep, that would be me.

So far I’ve not read one reason why the code should not be corrected. Is there a reason, or are we in the realms of veneration of the ancients?

Echoing what Rick said I don’t think many people “look under the bonnet”¹ and are more concerned with how fast does it go (and what paint job it has apparently²) so anyone that can make it work

1. as the existing software expects
2. as the users not blessed with Greater Yorkshire³ citizenship and language⁴ would like.

:)

¹ That translates as “look under the hood” if you’re in the USA

Yep, that would be me.

Hash-tag-me-too.

Unfortunately, French people can be extremely literal at times so self-deprecation and sarcasm can sometimes be responded to with completely serious straight answers…

David Feugey → didn’t they ever sub/dub Monty Python for you guys?

I think we should offer associate membership (at least) to those not born in Yorkshire

Yorkshire? Yorkshire? That’s… that’s… that’s north of the Watford Gap. It’s a big blank space on the map marked HIC SVNT LEONES.

Actually, I was born further north – Scotland. A whole different country.

Replies…probably ought to be sent on a postcard to Aldershot.