487772 - Rename ca-valencia locale to match IANA Language Subtags Registry description

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(Mozilla Localizations :: Other, enhancement)

Description

[Bernat]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux x86_64; roa-ES-val; rv:1.9.1b4pre) Gecko/20090315 Shiretoko/3.1b4pre
Build Identifier: 

In the list of addons, the language that was before listed as Valencian has been changed to "Catalan (Valencian)". This change should be rolled back since the name listed by IANA registry for code "ca-valencia" is Valencian. Axel told me privately that this kind of bugs would be marked as WONTFIX, but that didn't happen and he didn't hear my complaints on the issue.

Besides, this naming change is confusing for users, specially since there are addons using this same tag for different/incompatible languages. Users might complain that the extension fully tagged as Valencian isn't Catalan or has a lot of errors, and they're right with this new naming.

Catalan addons should be listed under the "ca" tag and use the labeling system to define it as  the Valencian version, just as they do name it in their description (not in the title though), like this:
- Catalan
- Catalan (Valencian version)

If Catalan extensions used this naming scheme consistently, not just in their descriptions, they would avoid any source of confusion.

Then Valencian version could use tag "ca-valencian" with its real name as defined by IANA, thus avoiding successfully any confusion between the two.

Catalan addons maintainers have asked before for changes that would clear any confusion for users, see bug 433465, we should rolled back the patch applied from bug 443053 and apply the naming scheme suggested here to clear things. This would be following good standard practice too as it follows IANA registry naming conventions better.

Reproducible: Always

Comment 1

[Gordon P. Hemsley [:GPHemsley]]

Linguists agree that Catalan and Valencian are essentially dialects of the same language. The IANA provides the 'ca-valencia' variant to allow for a distinction between the dialects to be made. Despite the description of the tag being, simply, "Valencian", the fact that the registration is a variant subtag of 'ca' makes it clear that the IANA supports Mozilla's position of calling it "Catalan (Valencian)".

Comment 2

[Gordon P. Hemsley [:GPHemsley]]

I'm renaming this bug to make it clearer what it is about.

I'm also providing the following link for more information about Valencian and its relation to Catalan:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valencian

Comment 3

[Toni Hermoso Pulido]

There were recent requests asking for another code from people supporting that Valencian is not Catalan, as the reporter of this bug, and they were denied in IANA mailing list:
http://www.alvestrand.no/pipermail/ietf-languages/2009-June/thread.html

Since we are not having other cases such as 'Spanish (Spain)' as 'Castilian', I do not think we should make any change, despite there may be people who could not like 'Spanish' term, or claiming that is not the official naming in their territory (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Names_given_to_the_Spanish_language), or even using their own adapted orthography.
At least, until ISO and/or IANA change their mind...

Strictly speaking, other solutions could be:
ca: Valencian
ca-valencia: Valencian (Valencian)
--
ca: Catalan; Valencian
ca-valencia: Catalan; Valencian (Valencian)

but for simplicity, and making it coherent among all other locales, I would stick to present naming.

Since I would not like to repeat pointless floods of messages as in previous bugs, I would close this bug.

Comment 4

[Bernat]

In reply to comment #1 and comment #2:
I don't know whether those linguists and wikipedians you mention use Firefox or not, but at least I guess they will be able to use it in their own language. I don't think Mozilla's mission is to support some linguists or wikipedians points of view.

We're not annoyed by people who think Valencian is the same as Catalan, but some people here seem very obsessed at Mozilla taking a stand about this when it shouldn't, it simply isn't their mission, but giving people support and respect their choices IS.

This re-interpretation of the IANA tags just adds to other re-interpretations against us, Firefox and Thunderbird users, namely:

* Forbidding a Valencian official translation. Might be a re-interpretation of Mozilla's mission against a part of their users.

* Forcing a warning message on Valencian extensions to avoid confusion then placing them together with newly created so-called Valencian addons which are just a copy of the Catalan ones. This is a re-interpretation of what's confusing and what's not.

We're very grateful to the the Mozilla Project for all we get and we give praise to everyone about it, but I don't think we can be all that happy when we're treated with less respect and given less support than other communities without any justification. So just closing this bug won't get us very far on these issues.

Comment 5

[Toni Hermoso Pulido]

I think undoubtedly positive and very recommendable that large international projects such as Mozilla take into account scientific and academical knowledge and adopt conventions from standardization bodies.
As Mozilla core localization team can tell, that's a real necessity when there could be potential difficult situations when different people from so many nations interact.

Regarding Valencian, worldwide academical consensus and linguistic official institutions accept what the reporter does not agree. I'm sorry, but therefore, I consider there is no other option than waiting for any future change of paradigm in linguistics knowledge and coding current conventions.
Since we are on the verge of getting off-topic again and I don't want to participate in another never-ending bug, I would close this bug myself. If there were any need of concrete actions, further explanations or specific counselling from any of the listed CC, please, do not hesitate to reopen it.

Comment 6

[Bernat]

Are you (In reply to comment #5)
> Since we are on the verge of getting off-topic again and I don't want to
> participate in another never-ending bug, I would close this bug myself. If
> there were any need of concrete actions, further explanations or specific
> counselling from any of the listed CC, please, do not hesitate to reopen it.

Are you really the one to decide? This won't get off-topic as long as no one starts a debate about linguistics and politics. Convention is mutable and changed by practices. Standards can be interpreted in several ways, as seen in this bug, they also might fall short and the world shouldn't get stuck by them.

Comment 7

[Wil Clouser [:clouserw]]

This is not an AMO bug, we follow the same as the rest of the Mozilla properties.  -> L10n product

Comment 8

[Francesco Lodolo [:flod]]

Re-closing. We're in the process of adding ca-valencia as an official language, and using "Catalan (Valencian)" as name.