On Wed, 26 Sep 2001, Bill Wohler wrote: > I think English should be an alias for en_US.
Of course you do; you're /from/ the US. > Having the English think that British English is the lingua franca of > the computing world is the same as the French thinking that French > is the lingua franca of the world. It's only wishful thinking. And believing that not just English, but /American/ English is somehow universal is the sort of arrogance typical of the provincial mindset for which Americans are notorious. > Note that SAP is one of many computing companies who have > standardized on American English. They have folks from *Great > Britain* translating the German into American English. And as a corporation, they're free to slight as many people as they want if it leads to higher profits.[1] But Debian is built on consensus, not on profit margins. We already have a consensus that there can never be a consensus on pointing 'English' to any particular regional variant of the language, because there is no single "right" answer to the question of which one is English. > Similarly, I wish that Debian required that documentation and output > appear in American English as well. Inconsistent styles reduces the > professional feel of the product. I observe here, wryly, that a larger percentage of work done on Debian, including documentation work, is done by non-native speakers of English than is done by native speakers of British English. Steve Langasek postmodern programmer [1] And British translators translating German text to American English is a testament only to the intellectual prowess of the British translators, not to the natural superiority of the American tongue.
