Default locale for Norway should be no_NO

Name: joT67522 Date: 11/17/97


I am not supplying steps to reproduce, since this
is really a problem report/suggestion regarding locale
definitions/documentations.


I might add that I think this is related to bug
report 4080001, I am currently involved in a project
with the people who wrote that one.

I am currently working with internationalization and
translation of WWW-related Java programs, and we are
encountering problems that might have to do with the
locale definitions for Norwegian language in JDK 1.1.4
for Windows NT. We can probably work around this, but
I am very puzzled about the information on supported
locales in your documentation, on this page:

http://java.sun.com/products/jdk/1.1/intl/html/intlspec.doc2.html#17314

The locales for Norway in the table are:

no_NO Norwegian (Nynorsk) Norway
no_NO_B Norwegian (Bokmål) Norway

As a Norwegian with long experience with software
internationalization/translation, I must say that
this does not make any sense to me.

The default locale for Norway MUST
be no_NO. The default language is "Norwegian (Bokmal)".
In other words, opposite of what you use.
"Norwegian (Nynorsk)" is a variation of Norwegian which
is never used in translation/localization. If used, this
is the language that should have a non-standard locale.

IBM, for example, realized this problem early, and have changed
the default locale for Norwegian (Bokmal) to no_NO in
Java 1.1.1 for OS/2.

I am not sure which authority decides on the default locales,
but I know (think) the default ISO locale for Norway is no_NO, and I
think Java should comply with that too. For builds and
translation of several languages for a product, it is important
that all countries can be identified with the default
5-character locale name, for consistency (i.e. no_NO for
Norway).

Thanks for considering my comments.

Best regards,
Øystein Kleven
(Review ID: 20153)
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