Talk:List of country names in various languages

message: Question:  you mention political changes--are you intending to include these in this list as well?  Such as Rhodesia, Holland...?  Quill 23:09, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: First (untitled heading)

message: I would have liked to add Etats-Unis  (United States), but the box formatting is too complicated.  I could not get it to work right.  Could this article be done with no boxes. AlainV 05:23, 8 Jul 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: It's fairly easy. Just copy and paste one of the existing boxes, and then replace the names of the countries and names of the languages. You can cut the rest and - you're there. IMO there's no other way of learning how the tables work (at least that's how I learned). Halibutt 10:23, Jul 8, 2004 (UTC)
what is the criteria for listing alternative names? There are so many languages that each entry would become unmanageable. --Jiang 20:49, 8 Jul 2004 (UTC)

text: This is a good question. However, so far I see no problem with it. We might want to find a list of languages that need to be included, but so far the lists are relatively short and quite easily manageable. Halibutt 09:34, Jul 9, 2004 (UTC)
If the intent is to translate it into as many languages as possible, then I can create a problem, first by copying China in world languages into this page. Why don't we just stick with primary/defacto/official languages? Anything else non-English is irrelevant here. --Jiang 16:23, 9 Jul 2004 (UTC)

text: Without further input, I will be converting this into what I have proposed. The rest belongs in wiktionary, not wikipedia. --Jiang 06:40, 13 Jul 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Converting into... what? You did not propose anything, you simply stated that the number of languages should be limited - but to which ones? Halibutt 07:00, Jul 13, 2004 (UTC)
The languages should be limited primary/defacto/official languages for each country. In addition, variants (official or otherwise) should be listed after the common name. Eg, "America" and "United States of America" would be both listed after "United States". How "United States" is spelled in Greek should not be listed here. --Jiang 07:29, 13 Jul 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Third (untitled heading) 

message: N.B. Σκόπια (Skópia) is the city, Σκοπία (Skopía) is the country. -- Picapica 10:37, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Σκόπια / Σκοπία 

message: I changed Cyrillic transliteration to ISO-9:1995 standard. I hope this makes text look more uniform.--Kulkuri 16:18, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: More uniform, yes, but not easy to read.  Most people don't use the ISO-9:1995 standard transliteration; I for one find it very ugly.  Why don't we use Wikipedia's own transliteration of Russian into English and for Ukrainian the Ukrainian National System described at Romanization of Ukrainian?  Or the "scholarly" system generally used by Slavicists? Or alternatively use the BGN/PCGN 1947 system, since we *are* dealing with geographic names here?  I would vote for the "scholarly" system since it's fairly unambiguous and it makes Cyrillic-using Slavic languages jibe tolerably well with Latin-using Slavic languages. --Angr 22:38, 28 Dec 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I changed my mind.  I think the BGN/PCGN system is best (not only for Cyrillic but for Greek as well) since it's most familiar to English speakers and probably the easiest for them to read.  I'm going to start converting the Russian and Ukrainian names to BGN/PCGN and hope no one objects and reverts all my changes. I'm not going to do the Belarusian ones since there seems to be some doubt as to their accuracy (see comment below). --Angr 16:02, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cyrillic transliteration 

message: There was mistake in article :pl:Afryka (I fixed it). There is stub article about mentioned country (I didn't write it) :pl:Republika Zielonego Przylądka.
To find cap named Cabo Verde see: Cap-Vert, Geography of Africa.
In polish there are three different names:
*Zielony Przylądek - cap in Senegal (Cap-Vert)
*Wyspy Zielonego Przylądka - archipelago near west coast of Africa
*Republika Zielonego Przylądka - country on those islands (Cabo Verde)
I'm shure what im doing. I'm Polish native speaker. Sorry if I made mistakes in english. radomil 16:33, 2 Sep 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, I'm sure I saw a map with Wyspy Zielonego Przylądka where the state name should be, but that might've been a simple mistake. However, due to consistency reasons we might simply change that to Wyspy.. since most other Slavic names use the islands rather than the republic (see Serbian, Slovene or Croat name). Anyway, this is a typical wiki naming problem rather than a conflict and no exclamation marks are needed. Cheers! Halibutt 20:51, Sep 2, 2004 (UTC)
I wont't argue. Of course there are maps with name Wyspy Zielonego Przylądka like there are maps with Cejlon (Ceylon) because these are names of geographical structures. States are named Republika Zielonego Przylądka and Sri Lanka. Because poeple usualy don't see the diffrences you can change Republika on Wyspy. Shortly: Republika - if You want to be purist, Wyspy - if not, but never simply Zielony Przylądek - because on in Polish it is a place in Senegal.
Of course in Poland we use names Francja and Polska but there's no such name for Cabo Verde. Do You see a difference now? radomil 04:58, 3 Sep 2004 (UTC)

text: Wyspy should be used (rather than Republika) in order to differentiate the island nation from the cape in Senegal (Cap-Vert). However, Radomil should realize that in several other languages the same name is used for both the place in Senegal and the archipelago country, without any confusion arising from that. (English is exceptional in preferring the French term for the cape.) I will go ahead and implement the change.
Pasquale 16:18, 3 Sep 2004 (UTC)

text: I am sorry but when I said "there is no capital, no city, even no cape by this name", I meant to say there isn't within the country of Cape Verde. When you wrote "cap" the first time, I thought you intended an abbreviation for "capital" (this is a common usage in English). Only later I realized you meant "cape" (BTW, the word in English for "przylądek" is "cape" not "cap", as you keep writing).</br>Also, I don't have any personal opinions on this matter. My only interest is also in ensuring correct information. Wyspy Zielonego Przylądka is certainly more correct than Zielony Przylądek in reference to the archipelago, but this does not necessarily mean that the island country is NEVER referred to simply as Zielony Przylądek.</br>The reference in :pl:Afryka (which you "fixed") was surely not an isolated occurrence. In any case, the person you should be arguing this out with is not me, but Youandme, who is certainly a native speaker of Polish as much as you and who put "Zielony Przylądek (Cape Verde)" in the article :pl:Afryka. BTW, that article also lists "Wyspy Świętego Tomasza i Książęca". Should you perhaps change that "Republika Świętego Tomasza i Książęca"?</br>Pasquale 19:28, 3 Sep 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Zielony Przyl&#261;dek or Republika Zielonego Przyl&#261;dka

message: I don't know who did the translation to Belarusian language, but I read first 10-12 countries names, and they are all wrong.
* Аўганістан not Афганистан
* Альбанія not Албания
* Альжыр not Алжир
* Антыгуа і Барбуда not Антигуа и Барбуда 
* Аргенціна not Аргентина
* Армэнія not Армения
Virtually 99% of them are wrong! --rydel 18:24, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Don't complain to us about it, just correct them! Obviously someone wasn't bothering to distinguish between Belarusian and Russian. --Angr 21:54, 28 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Belarus! 

message: At Myanmar there's a lengthy discussion about whether Burma should redirect to Myanmar (the way it is now) or Myanmar to Burma, or some other variation.  I don't want to start that whole argument again, but I would like to point out that the instructions for this page say that the most commonly used English name for a country is used, rather than the name that is considered "correct".  Bearing that in mind, I humbly submit that we move the "Myanmar" entry on this page to "Burma", because "Burma" is still much more commonly used in English than Myanmar.  I've already added a line for "Burma" saying "see Myanmar", but if nobody objects I'd rather have the information listed at "Burma" instead.
While we're at it, I think the "most commonly used name" criterion should apply to other languages as well.  For example, in the above discussion about what to call Cape Verde in Polish, the criterion should not be what Polish maps say, or what the Cape Verdean embassy in Warsaw calls itself, but rather what the average Pole says when he mentions to a friend, "I'm going to Cape Verde on my holiday next winter."
Nevertheless implementing the "most commonly used" criterion too rigidly could result in mistranslations.  For example, probably the most commonly used name for the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in English is "the U.K.", but in German it's "Großbritannien" or even "England".  (German friends thought it was ridiculously pedantic of me to correct them when they asked me how my trip to "England" was when I got back from Edinburgh.)  But obviously this article shouldn't pretend that the German name for "United Kingdom" is "Großbritannien" or "England", and it's beyond the scope of this article to point out that "Vereinigtes Königreich" sounds like officialese in German even though "United Kingdom" or its abbreviation "U.K." sounds quite normal in English. --Angr 21:54, 28 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Burma or Myanmar? "Most commonly used" criterion? 

message: This list is quite interesting, maybe even useful.
One problem as I see it is the presence of non-Roman scripts like Hebrew, Arabic, Chinese, Korean and Japanese (not to mention Indian languages, Thai, etc.). The problem is not very acute yet because many of these languages have yet to be added.
But when they are, we will have a jumble of scripts that no single person can read in its entirety. Now, in one sense the list is primarily a reference from which the user can pick the languages he/she needs. A speaker of Chinese would have no problem with Chinese characters, an Arabic-speaker with Arabic script, etc. . On the other hand, meaningless and indecipherable scripts are not of great value to the casual visitor who may be interested in seeing what a country is called in other languages. So the practice of adding Romanisation should really be adopted (as many have done already).
However, implementing this could end up causing a lot of complexity and confusion. I suggest that a standard format might be useful. That would make it easier to wade through the resulting mixture of exotic scripts and romanisation. An example might be: ベトナム =Betonamu (Japanese), 越南 =Etsunan (historic/academic Japanese), 越南 =Yuènán (Chinese). Or we could follow the usage that is already partly followed by some: Betonamu - ベトナム (Japanese), Etsunan - 越南 (historic/academic Japanese), Yuènán - 越南 (Chinese). There is a difference of order here (Romanisation first, native script second or native script first, Romanisation second) as well as a choice of links (hyphen, equal sign, or maybe nothing at all). What do others think? Bathrobe 05:00, 9 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I think you're right that romanization is needed, and we already had an inofficial standard of sorts before non-European languages. The practice that was established was to write: "Romanization — native script (language)", for example "Arzhentina - Аржентина (Bulgarian)". But the problem with that is, some scripts (most non-European scripts, in fact) do not lend themselves well to being written in italics. CJK characters, as far as I know, are never written in italics in real life, and so they shouldn't be here; neither are the Hebrew and Arabic alphabets. Maybe we should abandon the italics altogether and just go with "Romanization — native script (language)". The next problem is deciding on a romanization. Many languages have no official Romanization and several inofficial ones, or they may have an official Romanization that is different from the best-known one. The Bulgarian example above could also have been romanized Aržentina; and neither Hebrew nor Arabic has one single widely acknowledged romanization system. Still, maybe we can at least agree on a format for entries; agreeing on a romanization system is a different problem. I'm going to add a suggestion to the top of the page, and see what others think. --Angr/ 06:56, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

text: I recently redid the whole page, replacing entities with characters, and I also got rid of all the italics, because so few non-Roman alphabets really use them. I thought for consistency's sake it was better to have no italics at all than italics only in Cyrillic (and Greek, though I don't know to what extent italics are actually used in Greek writing). --Angr/ 19:46, 11 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: OK, then, fine.  Pasquale 20:44, 11 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Non Roman script 

message: I've added the  template because the article is 145 kb long, which is about three times longer than a good Wikipedia article should be. I'd like to discuss possibilities for breaking it up. The most obvious solution to my mind is to break it up by letters of the alphabet, for example:
*List of country names in various languages (A-C)
*List of country names in various languages (D-I)
*List of country names in various languages (J-P)
*List of country names in various languages (Q-Z)
but I'm open to other suggestions. --Angr/ 17:55, 12 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Being an administrator gives me more power, not more authority. I'd still like to field suggestions before doing anything rash. --Angr/ 21:32, 13 October 2005 (UTC)

text: I support the division by country names in alphabetical order. Olessi 23:13, 16 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for your support. Now that it's done, I'm taking the  tag off. --Angr/ 23:24, 16 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Very long 

message: I have posted an extensive ex post-facto Explanation on Mikkalai's talk page, in case anyone's interested.  Pasquale 20:56, 9 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: About the [[Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of country names in various languages]]

message: I would like to know, how are foreign names, which include various diacritics, treated in English language lists? Here, at the List of country names in various languages, the alphabetical order of various language alternatives of the same name does not seem to follow any rule as far as the diacritics is concerned. What is the correct order eg. for Armenia, Armênia, Armènia, Arménia and Armenía? I know that other languages have their rules for treating foreign diacritics, does anybody know, how is this done in English?Jan.Kamenicek 11:11, 24 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: This is my understanding of this issue: The diacritics do not affect the English alphabetical sorting. However, if several entries are exactly identical, except for the diacritics, as in the example you cited, they should be ranked starting with the entry without diacritics, then the entries with diacritics, beginning with those with the diacritics further to the left, with the diacritics in the following order (for example, for e): è é ê ë. So, for the example you cited, he answer is: Armenia, Armènia, Arménia, Armênia, Armenía. (By the way, the same happens in most Western European languages, except for French, where it is the same, except that the entries with diacritics are ranked beginning with those with the diacritics further to the right.)  Pasquale 16:36, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

text: I'm not sure, but I would apply the same principle and simply add those after the ones I mentioned. For example, a word which includes e with ogonek would follow another word which is identical but for the diacritic.   Pasquale 21:37, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

text: Ouch. That's a tough one. I would put the Maltese form first, because it has only one diacritic, but I'm not sure.  Pasquale 22:09, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  English alphabetical order and foreign diacritics 

message: A discussion has been started at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Countries/Lists of countries which could affect the inclusion criteria and title of this and other lists of countries.  Editors are invited to participate. Pfainuk talk 11:46, 17 December 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: New Discussion

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