ISO 639-1
Encyclopedia : I : IS : ISO : ISO 639-1
ISO 639-1 is the first part of the ISO 639 international-standard language-code family. It consists of 136 two-letter codes used to identify the world's major languages. These codes are a useful international shorthand for indicating languages. For example:
- English is represented by en
- German is represented by de (from the endonym Deutsch)
- Japanese is represented by ja (even though its endonym is Nihongo)
New ISO 639-1 codes are not added if an ISO 639-2 code exists, so systems that use ISO 639-1 and 639-2 codes, with 639-1 codes preferred, do not have to change existing codes.
See note in RFC 3066 section 2.3 Choice of language tag:
- "After the publication of ISO/DIS 639-1 as an International
- Standard, no new 2-letter code shall be added to ISO 639-1 unless a
- 3-letter code is also added at the same time to ISO 639-2. In
- addition, no language with a 3-letter code available at the time of
- publication of ISO 639-1 which at that time had no 2-letter code
- shall be subsequently given a 2-letter code."
Codes added after RFC publication in January 2001:
| ISO 639-1 | ISO 639-2 | Name | Change date | Change type | previously covered by |
| io | ido | Ido | 2002-01-15 | Add | art |
| wa | wln | Wallon | 2002-01-29 | Add | roa |
| li | lim | Limburgish | 2002-08-02 | Add | gem |
| ii | iii | Sichuan Yi | 2002-10-14 | Add | |
| an | arg | Aragonese | 2002-12-23 | Add | roa |
| ht | hat | Haitian Creole | 2003-02-26 | Add | cpf |
There is no specification on treatment of macrolanguages (see ISO 639-3).
See also
External links
- [ISO 639-1/RA]
- http://www.loc.gov/standards/iso639-2/faq.html#13
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