Re: The Language Code, take 2 (or 3)

Hey, Dirk -- this is dead ace stuff.

> T       type
>         f       fictional
>         l       logical
>         x       auxiliary
>         p       personal
>         n       natural
>         o       other
I would prefer 'e'/'engineered' to 'logical'.

Maybe also a parameter for associated culture, real or fictional?

> P       phonology
>         t       tonal
>                 c       contour tones
>                         r       register
>                         #       number of tones
>                 l       level tones
>                         !       downstep/downdrift
>                         #       number of tones
You're the phonologist, but I'd have thought that stuff like whether
tone is the property of the word or the syllable would be more
important/fundamental than, say, whether there is downstep.

> M       morphology
>         a       agglutinating (+/-)
>         i       isolating (+/-)
>         f       inflecting (+/-)
>         h       head-marking (+/-)
>         d       dependent-marking (+/-)
>         t#      number of distinct tenses
>         a#      number of distinct aspects
>         m#      number of distinct moods
>         t/a#    number of distinct tense/aspect combinations (where a
>                 meaningful distinction between tense and aspect cannot be
>                 made) (also t/m, a/m, etc)
>         c#      number of distinct cases
>         g#      number of genders or noun classes
>         n#      number of number distinctions
Does this mean (i) number of X in the grammar, (ii) number of X encoded
morphologically, or (iii) number of X encoded inflectionally? Since it's
in the Morphology section it must mean (ii) or (iii), but (iii) would
make sense only for Mf+. So maybe (ii) is meant; but that's much less
interesting.

For syntax, I urge a parameter for head-First/head-Last, e.g. English would
be Sf++, Livagain Sf+++++.

> English: Tn Pt*p++24,9(c)v(c) Wntar-- Mi++f+dt2a3c2n2 Sbsvoargn
> Lc++d+1000000+
Why "(c)v(c)"? That's an unusual characterization of the English syllable.
Or does c and v mean "one or more Cs/Vs"? I guess it must.

> Shoshoni: Tn Pt*p+++12,6(c)v(v/c) Wntar++++ Ma++f+h++d+t/a13c3n3
> Sbsovargn Lc+++d++25000?
> Tepa: Tf Pt*p+++11,4s(c)v(v/c) W* Mf++h+++t*a2c*n4 Sbv..argh Lcd+600
> Shemspreg: Tp Pt*p+22,5s(c)v(c) Wnar+++ Mf+d+++t/a3c3n2 Sbsvoargn
> Lc+d++1000
Livagian: Tfl Ptl3p++++28,8c(v) Wnadr++++(Wfsr++++)
Mi+++f+h++d----t0a0m0c4g0n0 Sb*argo Lc-d-2000-10000?

As soon as you declare the code fixed, you must get John to write his
perl thingo so one can actually read these codes.

--And.

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