A Taxonomy for TC304 -

ICT - European Localization Requirements

Date: 1998-11-23

1 Introduction and scope

-a taxonomy helps to identify all aspects of the domain in question which might be subject to standardization;

-a taxonomy helps to provide a logical structure for the standardization activity.

A taxonomy has been developed of relevant concepts in the domain of  European localization requirements, based on user requirements for functionality, as discussed in Clause 4 of Part I of  the CEN/TC304/PT01 report on User requirements on IT.

By way of an application, all known current standards and standardization activities have been grouped according to this taxonomy, thus forming another type of taxonomy, that of the standards themselves.

2 A taxonomy for European localization requirements.

The present classification of the concepts was made through the identification of commonalties, such as characters, sets, fonts and rules relating to presentation. The analysis was based on a much wider view of "multi-cultural support", which attempts to map some of its concepts. Areas relevant to this taxonomy were chosen and developed into the full taxonomy, shown in clause 3.2. This latter choice comprises the technology which relates to methods for specifying, and rules governing, the creation of unique properties and codes which facilitate the presentation, storage and transmission of individual characters.

The taxonomy in clause 3.2 was based on references ISO/IEC TR 10000-1, ISO TR 12382 and IEC 824 and the activities of appropriate standardization bodies, but most notably the work of CEN/TC304 and ISO/IEC/JTC 1.

3 Description of classification

3.1 Description

The taxonomy in clause 3.2 takes the classic form of a tree structure, where two major classes are recognized; Locales and Characters. The former deals with the cultural environment of the user, the latter with the smallest divisible parts that make up the messages which are being electronically processed.

A taxonomy of whatever phenomena can be constructed in several ways, depending on its purpose and the aspects applied. (For instance, a number of persons may be grouped firstly according to age, then according to gender, then according to place of living -- or precisely the other way around, according to need.) A taxonomy for standardization purposes naturally has to take into account the most practical ways to group existing standards and standardization projects as well as the logical connections between them and any conceptual "holes" which may need to be filled in order to cover the full need for standardization.

The following taxonomy is thus intended to provide a map for almost all of the user requirements. Therefore the level of subordination in some cases go very deep -- this does not mean that the actual standardization projects need a taxonomy of the same complexity. When a sub-level is empty of existing or future standards, the entries in that sub-level are simply collapsed and only the level above remains.

3.2 Taxonomy for TC304

4 Maintenance of the taxonomy

5 Bibliography