Re: Ada.Locales pseudo-string types

[Michael Rohan <michael@zanyblue.com>]

On Monday, August 6, 2012 9:45:46 AM UTC-7, Marius Amado-Alves wrote:
> Ada 2012 has this new Ada.Locales package (annex A.19) containing
> 
> 
> 
>    type Language_Code is array (1 .. 3) of Character range 'a' .. 'z';
> 
>    type Country_Code  is array (1 .. 2) of Character range 'A' .. 'Z';
> 
> 
> 
>    Language_Unknown : constant Language_Code := "und";
> 
>    Country_Unknown  : constant Country_Code := "ZZ";
> 
> 
> 
>    function Language return Language_Code;
> 
>    function Country return Country_Code;
> 
> 
> 
> Now how does one print the darn codes? Should not Ada.Text_IO.Put for String work? Should not the types be convertible to String?
> 
> Thanks a lot.

Hi,

It this really the all that's defined for Locales!  At least the language code is of the correct length 1 .. 3, however the country code should also be 1 .. 3, 

On Monday, August 6, 2012 9:45:46 AM UTC-7, Marius Amado-Alves wrote:
> Ada 2012 has this new Ada.Locales package (annex A.19) containing
> 
> 
> 
>    type Language_Code is array (1 .. 3) of Character range 'a' .. 'z';
> 
>    type Country_Code  is array (1 .. 2) of Character range 'A' .. 'Z';
> 
> 
> 
>    Language_Unknown : constant Language_Code := "und";
> 
>    Country_Unknown  : constant Country_Code := "ZZ";
> 
> 
> 
>    function Language return Language_Code;
> 
>    function Country return Country_Code;
> 
> 
> 
> Now how does one print the darn codes? Should not Ada.Text_IO.Put for String work? Should not the types be convertible to String?
> 
> Thanks a lot.

Hi,

Looks like this probably needs to be adjusted Language 1 .. 3 is OK, but Country should really be Territory 1 .. 3, e.g., Latin America has the code "419".  It is also missing a definition for the Script, e.g., Simplified Chinese as spoken in China is zh_Hans_CN, and Serbian has two variants for the same territory:

sr_Cyrl_SR, Serbian as spoken in Serbia using the Cyrillic script
sr_Latn_SR, Serbian as spoken in Serbia using the Latin script

So the locales package should be adjusted to include

    type Script_Code is array (1 .. 4) of Character; -- 'a' .. 'z' + 'A' .. 'Z'
    function Script return Script_Code;

There's nothing here to adjust locale, etc.  I guess this is start on making Ada locale aware but it looks like there's a lot of additional work needed.

I've done some work in this area with my ZanyBlue library (http://zanyblue.sourceforge.net) and it would be good to see a more globalization friendly Ada.

Take care,
Michael