Language Tag Mapping for Accurate Identification

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Solution Overview

Problem

Conventional language tag parsing mechanisms, such as the 'fall back' approach, are inefficient as they progressively reduce language specificity, often resulting in the use of a default language, which may not align with the user's preferred language, especially when supporting multiple variants like British and Australian English.

Innovation Solution

Implementing a mapping mechanism that allows language tags to be mapped to more specific alternatives, enabling 'fall forward' and 'lateral' mappings to identify supported languages, thereby avoiding the use of default languages and aligning with user preferences without requiring extensive support for all variants.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Reliability

If a fall back approach is used to parse language tags, then the mechanism can handle unsupported language variants by removing subtags, but the language specificity is progressively reduced and may result in using a default language that does not align with user preferences

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvelanguage identification accuracyVSAvoidlanguage specificity

Core Design Contradiction:

ReliabilityVSLoss of information

Solution Approach 1:

The patent inverts the conventional fall back approach by implementing a fall forward mechanism. Instead of removing subtags when language is not supported, the system adds mapping information to language tags to resolve ambiguities. This allows the system to move from less specific to more specific language identifiers, preserving user preference information while ensuring supported language variants are used.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #13The other way round (Inversion)

Solution Approach 2:

The patent introduces language tag mappings as an intermediary mechanism between user language preferences and supported language variants. These mappings act as a mediator that translates user preferences (which may include unsupported variants like Australian English) into supported variants (such as British English or US English), thereby resolving the contradiction between preserving specificity and ensuring support.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #24Intermediary (Mediator)

2Reliability

If an entity provides support for multiple language variants, then language identification accuracy improves, but the complexity of language support increases significantly

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvelanguage identification accuracyVSAvoidlanguage support complexity

Core Design Contradiction:

ReliabilityVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The patent makes language tag mappings universal by allowing a single mapping entry to serve multiple purposes. The mappings mechanism can handle various scenarios including unsupported variants, regional variations, and legacy language tags, all through the same mapping infrastructure. This multi-functionality reduces the need for separate handling mechanisms for each language variant scenario.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #6Universality (Multi-functionality)

Solution Approach 2:

The patent creates a simplified representation of language support requirements through mapping entries. Instead of implementing full support for every language variant, the system copies the essential mapping relationships from a reference set. This allows the system to infer support for multiple variants through a compact mapping structure rather than implementing each variant explicitly.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #26Copying

3Ease of operation

If the fall back mechanism removes subtags progressively, then unsupported language variants are handled, but the user's preferred language may not be identified correctly

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvelanguage tag parsing simplicityVSAvoidlanguage preference identification accuracy

Core Design Contradiction:

Ease of operationVSMeasurement precision

Solution Approach 1:

The patent applies preliminary action by pre-establishing language tag mappings before language identification occurs. These mappings are prepared in advance and stored in a data structure that can be quickly queried. When a language tag is encountered, the system checks the pre-computed mappings to determine the appropriate supported language variant, avoiding the need for complex real-time analysis and ensuring accurate language preference identification.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #10Preliminary action

Data Source

PatentUS9569421B2Method and system for improved language identification using language tags

Publication Date: 2017.02.14 R2 SOLUTIONS LLC

AI summary

Disclosed herein is an ability to identify a supported language. A current language tag including one or more subtags, each subtag providing language identification information. In response to determining that a language referenced by the current language tag is not a supported language, accessing a stored set of mappings including one or more mappings, each mapping associating a first language tag with a second language tag, determining whether or not a mapping in the set of mappings includes the current language tag as one of the first and second language tags and a new language tag as the other of the first and second language tags, and using the new language tag as the current language tag to identify the supported language.