[sword-devel] ThML and OSIS references

Chris Little sword-devel@crosswire.org
Mon, 22 Dec 2003 15:12:41 -0600


Troy A. Griffitts wrote:
> PS.  Just so Chris doesn't jump all over me... There has been 'talk' 
> about providing a way to translate the meta information (tag names, 
> attribute name, etc.) into other languages (would use UTF8).  If this 
> ever happened, than it would follow that these abbreviations would also 
> likely be candidates for translation.  I think the whole idea is silly 
> :), but hey, it may happen anyway! :)

I really hope you're talking about the really old idea people had of 
translating the elements, not the book abbreviations.  We've been pretty 
consistent in the decision that BTG won't make abbreviations up, we will 
just adopt whatever SBL chooses (speaking of Bible book abbreviations here).

The book abbreviations that occur in osisRefs are not for human 
consumption.  Their resemblance to book names in English is intended to 
aid encoders as a mnemonic.

Translating them would be an all around bad idea and break 
interoperability (or, at least, make it more difficulty without any 
benefit).

--Chris