ISO 639 167052 223326510 2008-07-03T16:06:40Z Sl 126396 '''ISO 639''' is the set of [[International Organization for Standardization|international standards]] that lists short [[language code|codes]] for [[language]] names. It was also the name of the original standard, approved in 1967 and withdrawn in 2002. ISO 639 consists of different parts, of which two parts have been approved and a third part that is in the final approval (FDIS) stage. The other parts are works in progress. *[[ISO 639-1]]:2002 ''Codes for the representation of names of languages -- Part 1: Alpha-2 code''; [[List of ISO 639-1 codes]] *[[ISO 639-2]]:1998 ''Codes for the representation of names of languages -- Part 2: Alpha-3 code''; [[List of ISO 639-2 codes]] *[[ISO 639-3]]:2007 ''Codes for the representation of names of languages -- Part 3: Alpha-3 code for comprehensive coverage of languages''; [[List of ISO 639-3 codes]] *[[ISO 639-4|ISO/CD 639-4]]:2008? ''Codes for the representation of names of languages -- Part 4: Implementation guidelines and general principles for language coding'' *[[ISO 639-5]]:2008 ''Codes for the representation of names of languages -- Part 5: Alpha-3 code for language families and groups''; May 15, 2008 *[[ISO 639-6|ISO/CD 639-6]]:2008? ''Codes for the representation of names of languages -- Part 6: Alpha-4 representation for comprehensive coverage of language variation'' ==Use of ISO 639 codes== The language codes defined in the several sections of ISO 639 are used for bibliographic purposes and, in computing and internet environments, as a key element of [[locale]] data. The codes also find use in various applications, such as [[Wikipedia]] [[Uniform Resource Locator|URL]]s for its different language editions. ==Alpha-2 code space== "Alpha-2" codes (for codes composed of 2 letters of the [[Alphabets derived from the Latin#Basic Latin Alphabet|basic Latin alphabet]]) are used in [[ISO 639-1]]. Thus, there are <math>26^2=676</math> distinct Alpha-2 codes. This is clearly insufficient to cover all languages, which led to the creation of [[ISO 639-2]] and the use of Alpha-3 codes. <!--This could be worded better, acknowledging that 639-1 existed before -2, though the latter was formally published first--> ==Alpha-3 code space== "Alpha-3" codes (for codes composed of 3 letters of the [[Alphabets derived from the Latin#Basic Latin Alphabet|basic Latin alphabet]]) are used in [[ISO 639-2]] and [[ISO 639-3]] and will eventually be used in [[ISO 639-5]]. Mathematically, the upper limit for the number of languages and language collections that can be so represented is <math>26^3=17,576</math>. The common use of Alpha-3 codes by three parts of ISO 639 requires some coordination within a larger system. Part 2 defines four special codes <code>mul</code>, <code>und</code>, <code>mis</code>, <code>zxx</code>, a reserved range <code>qaa-qtz</code> (20 × 26 = 520 codes) and has 23 double entries (the B/T codes). This sums up to 520 + 23 + 4 = 547 codes that cannot be used in part 3 to represent languages or in part 5 to represent language families or groups. The remainder is 17,576 – 547 = 17,029. <!-- A further tighter upper limit can be calculated by subtracting the numbers of language collections from ISO 639-2. [Comment: This sentence appears in the article on ISO 639-3. If it is retained here, it might be rewritten to include in a broader overview of the Alpha-3 space. In general as I understand it, most 639-2 codes are also in 639-3, so the math here might be a little misleading.]--> There are somewhere around six or seven thousand languages on Earth today[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_endangered_languages][http://www.ethnologue.com/ethno_docs/distribution.asp?by=family]. So those 17,029 codes are adequate to assign a unique code to each language, although some languages may end up with arbitrary codes that sound nothing like traditional name(s) of that language. ==Alpha-4 code space== "Alpha-4" codes (for codes composed of 4 letters of the [[Alphabets derived from the Latin#Basic Latin Alphabet|basic Latin alphabet]]) is proposed to be used in ISO 639-6. Mathematically, the upper limit for the number of languages and dialects that can be so represented is <math>26^4=456,976</math>. ==See also== *[[list of ISO 639-1 codes]] *[[list of ISO 639-2 codes]] *[[list of ISO 639-3 codes]] *[[language code]] *[[language families and languages]] *[[list of languages]] *[[list of official languages]] *[[ISO 3166]] (codes for countries) *[[ISO 15924]] (codes for [[writing system]]s) *[[IETF language tag]]s (based on ISO 639) ==External links== *[http://www.loc.gov/standards/iso639-2/ ISO 639-2 Registration Authority] *[http://fara.cs.uni-potsdam.de/~georgk/639.xml XML version] of the official ISO 639-2 HTML data from the [[Library of Congress]] *[http://www.sil.org/iso639-3/ ISO 639-3 Registration Authority] *[http://www.ethnologue.com/iso639/ ISO 639 and the Ethnologue] *[http://www.prato.linux.it/~lmasetti/seriamente/index.php?sez=materiali&subsect=iso639 Language codes in English and Italian] with Perl scripts for parsing and PHP code *[http://www.bsi-global.com British Standards Institute] [[Category:ISO standards|#00639]] [[Category:ISO 639| ]] [[Category:Identifiers]] [[Category:Universal identifiers]] [[af:ISO 639]] [[als:ISO 639]] [[ast:ISO 639]] [[az:ISO 639]] [[zh-min-nan:ISO 639]] [[be-x-old:ISO 639]] [[bh:ISO 639]] [[bs:ISO 639]] [[br:ISO 639]] [[bg:ISO 639]] [[ca:ISO 639]] [[cv:ISO 639]] [[cs:ISO 639]] [[cy:ISO 639]] [[da:ISO 639]] [[de:ISO 639]] [[el:ISO 639]] [[es:ISO 639]] [[eo:ISO 639]] [[eu:ISO 639]] [[fr:ISO 639]] [[fy:ISO 639]] [[fur:ISO 639]] [[gl:ISO 639]] [[ko:ISO 639]] [[hi:आइएसओ 639]] [[id:ISO 639]] [[ia:ISO 639]] [[ie:ISO 639]] [[is:ISO 639]] [[it:ISO 639]] [[jv:ISO 639]] [[kn:ಐಎಸ್‍ಒ ೬೩೯]] [[csb:ISO 639]] [[la:ISO 639]] [[lv:ISO 639]] [[hu:ISO 639]] [[mk:ISO 639]] [[ms:ISO 639]] [[nl:ISO 639]] [[ja:ISO 639]] [[no:ISO 639]] [[nn:ISO 639]] [[oc:ISO 639]] [[nds:ISO 639]] [[pl:ISO 639]] [[pt:ISO 639]] [[ksh:ISO 639]] [[ro:ISO 639]] [[ru:ISO 639]] [[se:ISO 639]] [[sco:ISO 639]] [[sq:ISO 639]] [[scn:ISO 639]] [[sk:ISO 639]] [[sl:ISO 639]] [[sr:ISO 639]] [[fi:ISO 639]] [[sv:ISO 639]] [[tt:ISO 639]] [[th:ISO 639]] [[tg:ISO 639]] [[tr:ISO 639]] [[uk:ISO 639]] [[vec:ISO 639]] [[zh:ISO 639]]