Details
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Type:
Improvement
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Status: Won't Do
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Priority:
Minor
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Resolution: Won't Do
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Affects Version/s: 4.4.4
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Fix Version/s: Unscheduled
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Component/s: Internationalisation
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Labels:None
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Versioning Impact:Patch (backwards-compatible bug fixes)
Description
The current representation of contact language as an enum is a blocker for the Wikimedia Foundation to upgrade from Civi 4.2. If it's convenient to display a select dropdown for most installations, that's one thing... but to constrain the possible languages to a fixed list doesn't make any sense.
My suggestion is that we go back to free-form data, and adhere to a standard such as BCP-47. I've written a library that we could use to manage this data.
We will gain: nullability of preferred_language, ability to represent a fallback chain of multiple languages spoken, and script preferences.