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Addison Phillips edited this page Mar 7, 2025 · 175 revisions

MessageFormat Working Group

Welcome to the home page for the MessageFormat Working Group, a subgroup of the Unicode CLDR-TC.

Charter

The Message Format Working Group (MFWG) is tasked with developing an industry standard for the representation of localizable message strings to be a successor to ICU MessageFormat. MFWG will recommend how to remove redundancies, make the syntax more usable, and support more complex features, such as gender, inflections, and speech. MFWG will also consider the integration of the new standard with programming environments, including, but not limited to, ICU, DOM, and ECMAScript, and with localization platform interchange. The output of MFWG will be a specification for the new syntax, which is expected to be on track to become a Unicode Technical Standard.

Participation / Joining the Working Group

We are looking for participation from software developers, localization engineers and others with experience in Internationalization (I18N) and Localization (L10N). If you wish to contribute to this work, please review the information about the Contributor License Agreement.

To follow this work:

  1. Apply to join our mailing list
  2. Watch this repository (use the "Watch" button in the upper right corner)

To contribute to this work, in addition to the above:

  1. Each individual MUST have a copy of the CLA on file.
  2. Individuals who are employees of Unicode Member organizations SHOULD contact their member representative. Individuals who are not employees of Unicode Member organizations MUST contact the chair to request Invited Expert status. Employees of Unicode Member organizations MAY also apply for Invited Expert status, subject to approval from their member representative.

Meeting Agenda

This is the agenda document for upcoming calls of the MessageFormat subcommittee. We normally meet weekly on Mondays at 9:30 Pacific (America/Los_Angeles). This is currently UTC+7.

See here for your local time.

Information on joining calls is found in the calendar invite.

Scribe

This block reserved for scribe rotation.

Recent scribes:

  • 2025-02-24 MIH, TIM
  • 2025-02-17 RGN
  • 2025-02-10 MED, MRR
  • 2025-02-03 MIH
  • 2025-01-28 MRR <- overachiever
  • 2025-01-21 MRR
  • 2025-01-13 ECH
  • 2024-12-16 MIH
  • 2024-12-09 RGN
  • 2024-11-25 TIM
  • 2024-11-18 ECH
  • 2024-11-11 MIH
  • 2024-11-03 ECH
  • 2024-10-28 HGO
  • 2024-10-21 APP
  • 2024-10-14 MIH
  • 2024-10-07 TIM
  • 2024-09-30 EAO
  • 2024-09-09 HGO
  • 2024-09-02 (no quorum)
  • 2024-08-26 ECH
  • 2024-08-19 MIH, ECH
  • 2024-08-12 RGN
  • 2024-08-05 TIM
  • 2024-07-29 ECH
  • 2024-07-22 HGO
  • 2024-07-15 LCA, USA
  • 2024-07-08 MIH
  • 2024-07-01 TIM
  • 2024-06-24 STA
  • 2024-06-17 ECH
  • 2024-06-10 n/a
  • 2024-06-03 MRR (removing pre-2024 history)

Notes Document for The Upcoming Call

NOTE WELL

The next meeting will be 10 March 2025 and is a regular WG Teleconference call.

Homework

Agenda

To request that the chair add an issue to the agenda, add the label Agenda+ To request that the chair add an agenda item, send email to the message-format-wg group email.

Topic: Info Share, Project Planning

Chair: changes to repo, labels, feedback template for post-47

Topic: PR Review

Timeboxed review of items ready for merge.

PR Description Recommendation
#1056 @can-copy can copy Merge
#1054 Make option resolution return something if rv is a fallback value Discuss
#1050 Drop tests relying on u:locale Discuss
#1048 Fix select tests to not presume fallback for formatting Merge
#1011 Require prioritizing syntax and data model errors Discuss

Topic: Rechartering and Goals (#1051)

We need to set goals for the working group since we’ve partly or wholly disposed of the ones we had.

Topic: W3C TAG Review

The W3C TAG has not quite officially completed their review, but the proto-comments are present. Let’s review and respond.

Topic: Development, Deployment, and Maintenance of the former “messageformat.dev” (#1043)

Luca Casonato kindly donated the documentation site to Unicode. We need to start planning how to maintain, deploy, and manage it.

Topic: Issue review

https://github.com/unicode-org/message-format-wg/issues

Currently we have 40 open (was 39 last time).

  • 0 are tagged for 47
  • 25 are tagged for 48
  • 2 are tagged “Seek-Feedback-in-Preview”
  • 5 are tagged “Future”
  • 15 are Preview-Feedback
  • 1 is tagged Feedback
  • 0 are resolve-candidate and proposed for close.
  • 4 are Agenda+ and proposed for discussion (see below)
  • 0 are ballots
Issue Description Recommendation
#1052 [FEEDBACK] TAG Review Discuss
#1051 Plans for v48 Discuss
#1043 Deployment, Development, and Maintenance of “messageformat.dev” Discuss
#866 CLDR semantic datetime skeleton spec is nearly ready and MF2 should use it Discuss (next week)

We should review the “seek-feedback-in-preview” and “future” items.

Topic: AOB?

Design Status

What is the status of our various design docs?

Doc Description Status
dataflow-composability Data Flow for Composable Functions Proposed (Obsolete?)
maintaining-registry Maintaining the function registry Proposed, Discuss
number-selection Define how selection on numbers happens Revision Proposed
Accepted, Obsolete, and Rejected Designs
Doc Description Status
function-composition-part-1 Function Composition Obsolete
beauty-contest Choose between syntax options Obsolete
selection-matching-options Selection Matching Options (ballot) Obsolete
syntax-exploration-2 Balloting of the revised syntax used in the Tech Preview Obsolete
variants A collection of message examples which require a branching logic to handle grammatical variations Obsolete
formatted-parts Define how format-to-parts works Rejected
quoted-literals Document the rationale for including quoted literals in MF and for choosing the | as the quote symbol Accepted
builtin-registry-capabilities Tech Preview default registry definition Accepted
code-mode-introducer Choose the pattern for complex messages Accepted
data-driven-tests Capture the planned approach for the test suite Accepted
default-registry-and-mf1-compatibility Default Registry and MF1 Compatibility Accepted
delimiting-variant-patterns Delimiting of Patterns in Complex Messages (Ballot) Accepted
error-handling Decide whether and what implementations do after a runtime error Accepted
exact-match-selector-options Choose the name for the “exact match” selector function (this is :string) Accepted
expression-attributes Define how attributes may be attached to expressions Accepted
open-close-placeholders Describe the use cases and requirements for placeholders that enclose parts of a pattern Accepted
overriding-extending-namespacing Defines how externally-authored functions can appear in a message; how externally authored options can appear; and effect of namespacing Accepted
pattern-exterior-whitespace Specify how whitespace inside of a pattern (at the start/end) works Accepted
string-selection-formatting Define how selection and formatting of string values takes place. Accepted
variable-mutability Describe how variables are named and how externally passed variables and internally defined variables interact Accepted
bidi-usability Manage bidi isolation Accepted
selection-declaration Effect of selectors on subsequent placeholders Accepted

Topic: AOB?

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