Welcome to language_tags’s documentation!¶

This Python API offers a way to validate and lookup languages tags.

Standard: It is based on BCP 47 (RFC 5646) and the latest IANA language subtag registry.

This project will be updated as the standards change.
JSON data: See the language-subtag-registry project for the underlying JSON data.
Javascript version: This project is a Python version of the language-tags Javascript project.

Introduction¶

This Python API offers a way to validate and lookup languages tags.

Import the module:

from language_tags import tags

To check whether the language_tag is valid use tags.check(). For example ‘nl-Be’ is valid but ‘nl-BE-BE’ is invalid.

> print(tags.check('nl-BE'))
True
> print(tags.check('nl-BE-BE'))
False

For meaningful error output see tags.tag().errors:

> errors = tags.tag('nl-BE-BE').errors
> for err in errors
>    print(err.message)
Extra region subtag 'BE' found.

Lookup descriptions of tags:

> print(tags.description('nl-BE'));
['Dutch', 'Flemish', 'Belgium']

Lookup descriptions of a language subtag:

> print(tags.language('nl').description);
['Dutch', 'Flemish']

Lookup tags by description:

> language_subtags = tags.search('Flemish')
> print(language_subtags[0])
'nl'

Get the language subtag of a tag:

> print(repr(tags.tag('nl-BE').language))
'{"subtag": "nl", "record": {"Subtag": "nl", "Suppress-Script": "Latn", "Added": "2005-10-16", "Type": "language", "Description": ["Dutch", "Flemish"]}, "type": "language"}'

A redundant tag is a grandfathered registration whose individual subtags appear with the same semantic meaning in the registry [1]. A redundant tag has descriptions and can have a preferred tag.

> redundant_tag = tags.tag('es-419')
> print(redundant_tag.descriptions)
['Latin American Spanish']
> print(redundant_tag.valid)
True
> print(redundant_tag.region.description)
['Latin America and the Caribbean']
> print(redundant_tag.region.language)
['Spanish', 'Castilian']

The remainder of the previously registered tags are “grandfathered” [1]. Grandfathered tags cannot be parsed into subtags. A grandfathered tag has descriptions. Most grandfathered tags have valid perferred tags.

> grandfathered_tag = tags.tag('i-klingon')
> print(grandfathered_tag.descriptions)
['Klingon']
> print(grandfathered_tag.valid)
False
> print(grandfathered_tag.subtags)
[]
> print(grandfathered_tag.preferred)
tlh
> preferred_tag = grandfathered_tag.preferred
> print(preferred_tag.language.description)
['Klingon', 'tlhIngan-Hol']

For the complete api documentation see next chapter.

[1]	(1, 2) RFC 5646

API Documentation¶

Class tags¶

class language_tags.tags.tags[source]¶

static check()[source]¶

Check if a string (hyphen-separated) tag is valid.

Parameters:	tag (str) – (hyphen-separated) tag.
Returns:	bool – True if valid.

static date()[source]¶

Get the file date of the underlying data as a string.

Returns:	date as string (for example: ‘2014-03-27’).

static description()[source]¶

Gets a list of descriptions given the tag.

Parameters:	tag (str) – (hyphen-separated) tag.
Returns:	list of string descriptions. The return list can be empty.

static filter()[source]¶

Get a list of non-existing string subtag(s) given the input string subtag(s).

Parameters:	subtags – string subtag or a list of string subtags.
Returns:	list of non-existing string subtags. The return list can be empty.

static language()[source]¶

Get a language language_tags.Subtag.Subtag of the subtag string.

Parameters:	subtag (str) – subtag.
Returns:	language `language_tags.Subtag.Subtag` if exists, otherwise None.

static languages()[source]¶

Get a list of language_tags.Subtag.Subtag objects given the string macrolanguage.

Parameters:	macrolanguage (string) – subtag macrolanguage.
Returns:	a list of the macrolanguage `language_tags.Subtag.Subtag` objects.
Raises:	Exception – if the macrolanguage does not exists.

static region()[source]¶

Get a region language_tags.Subtag.Subtag of the subtag string.

Parameters:	subtag (str) – subtag.
Returns:	region `language_tags.Subtag.Subtag` if exists, otherwise None.

static search(all=False)[source]¶

Gets a list of language_tags.Subtag.Subtag objects where the description matches.

Parameters:	description (str or RegExp) – a string or compiled regular expression. For example: `search(re.compile('\d{4}'))` if the description of the returned subtag must contain four contiguous numerical digits. all (bool, optional) – If set on True grandfathered and redundant tags will be included in the return list.
Returns:	list of `language_tags.Subtag.Subtag` objects each including the description. The return list can be empty.

static subtags()[source]¶

Get a list of existing language_tags.Subtag.Subtag objects given the input subtag(s).

Parameters:	subtags – string subtag or list of string subtags.
Returns:	a list of existing `language_tags.Subtag.Subtag` objects. The return list can be empty.

static tag()[source]¶

Get a language_tags.Tag.Tag of a string (hyphen-separated) tag.

Parameters:	tag (str) – (hyphen-separated) tag.
Returns:	`language_tags.Tag.Tag`.

static type(type)[source]¶

Get a language_tags.Subtag.Subtag by subtag and type. Can be None if not exists.

Parameters:	subtag (str) – subtag. type (str) – type of the subtag.
Returns:	`language_tags.Subtag.Subtag` if exists, otherwise None.

static types()[source]¶

Get the types of a subtag string (excludes redundant and grandfathered).

Parameters:	subtag (str) – subtag.
Returns:	list of types. The return list can be empty.

Class Tag¶

class language_tags.Tag.Tag(tag)[source]¶

Tags for Identifying Languages based on BCP 47 (RFC 5646) and the latest IANA language subtag registry.

Parameters:	tag (str) – (hyphen-separated) tag.

added¶

Get the date string of grandfathered or redundant tag when it was added to the registry.

Returns:	added date string if the deprecated or redundant tag has one, otherwise None.

deprecated¶

Get the deprecation date of grandfathered or redundant tag if the tag is deprecated.

Returns:	deprecation date string if the deprecated or redundant tag has one, otherwise None.

descriptions¶

Get the list of descriptions of the grandfathered or redundant tag.

Returns:	list of descriptions. If no descriptions available, it returns an empty list.

error(code, subtag=None)[source]¶

Get the language_tags.Tag.Tag.Error of a specific Tag error code. The error creates a message explaining the error. It also refers to the respective (sub)tag(s).

Parameters:

code (int) –
a Tag error error:
- 1 = Tag.ERR_DEPRECATED
- 2 = Tag.ERR_NO_LANGUAGE
- 3 = Tag.ERR_UNKNOWN,
- 4 = Tag.ERR_TOO_LONG
- 5 = Tag.ERR_EXTRA_REGION
- 6 = Tag.ERR_EXTRA_EXTLANG
- 7 = Tag.ERR_EXTRA_SCRIPT,
- 8 = Tag.ERR_DUPLICATE_VARIANT
- 9 = Tag.ERR_WRONG_ORDER
- 10 = Tag.ERR_SUPPRESS_SCRIPT,
- 11 = Tag.ERR_SUBTAG_DEPRECATED
- 12 = Tag.ERR_EXTRA_LANGUAGE
subtag – string (sub)tag or list of string (sub)tags creating the error.

Returns:

An exception class containing: a Tag error input code, the derived message with the given (sub)tag(s). input

errors¶

Get the errors of the tag. If invalid then the list will consist of errors containing each a code and message explaining the error. Each error also refers to the respective (sub)tag(s).

Returns:	list of errors of the tag. If the tag is valid, it returns an empty list.

format¶

Get format according to algorithm defined in RFC 5646 section 2.1.1.

Returns:	formatted tag string.

language¶

Get the language language_tags.Subtag.Subtag of the tag.

Returns:	language `language_tags.Subtag.Subtag` that is part of the tag. The return can be None.

preferred¶

Get the preferred language_tags.Tag.Tag of the deprecated or redundant tag.

Returns:	preferred `language_tags.Tag.Tag` if the deprecated or redundant tag has one, otherwise None.

region¶

Get the region language_tags.Subtag.Subtag of the tag.

Returns:	region `language_tags.Subtag.Subtag` that is part of the tag. The return can be None.

script¶

Get the script language_tags.Subtag.Subtag of the tag.

Returns:	script `language_tags.Subtag.Subtag` that is part of the tag. The return can be None.

subtags¶

Get the language_tags.Subtag.Subtag objects of the tag.

Returns:	list of `language_tags.Subtag.Subtag` objects that are part of the tag. The return list can be empty.

type¶

Get the type of the tag (either grandfathered, redundant or tag see RFC 5646 section 2.2.8.).

Returns:	string – type of the tag.

valid¶

Checks whether the tag is valid.

Returns:	Bool – True if valid otherwise False.

Class Subtag¶

class language_tags.Subtag.Subtag(subtag, type)[source]¶

A subtag is a part of the hyphen-separated language_tags.Tag.Tag.

Parameters:

subtag (str) – subtage.
type (str) – can be ‘language’, ‘extlang’, ‘script’, ‘region’ or ‘variant’.

Returns:

raise Error:	Checks for `Subtag.ERR_NONEXISTENT` and `Subtag.ERR_TAG`.

added¶

Get the date when the subtag was added to the registry.

Returns:	date (as string) when the subtag was added to the registry.

comments¶

Get the comments of the subtag.

Returns:	list of comments. The return list can be empty.

deprecated¶

Get the deprecation date.

Returns:	deprecation date as string if subtag is deprecated, otherwise None.

description¶

Get the subtag description.

Returns:	list of description strings.

format¶

Get the subtag code conventional format according to RFC 5646 section 2.1.1.

Returns:	string – subtag code conventional format.

preferred¶

Get the preferred subtag.

Returns:	preferred `language_tags.Subtag.Subtag` if exists, otherwise None.

scope¶

Get the subtag scope.

Returns:	string subtag scope if exists, otherwise None.

script¶

Get the language’s default script of the subtag (RFC 5646 section 3.1.9)

Returns:	string – the language’s default script.

type¶

Get the subtag type.

Returns:	string – either ‘language’, ‘extlang’, ‘script’, ‘region’ or ‘variant’.

History¶

0.4.5¶

Close files after opening #38

0.4.4¶

Bug fix release: language tag ‘aa’ is detected as invalid #27

0.4.3¶

Upgrade to https://github.com/mattcg/language-subtag-registry/releases/tag/v0.3.18

0.4.2¶

Official python 3.5 compatibility
Upgrade to https://github.com/mattcg/language-subtag-registry/releases/tag/v0.3.15

0.4.1¶

Included the data folder again in the project package.
Added bash script (update_data_files.sh) to download the language-subtag-registry and move this data in the data folder of the project.

0.4.0¶

Allow parsing a redundant tag into subtags.
Added package.json file for easy update of the language subtag registry data using npm (npm install or npm update)
Improvement of the language-tags.tags.search function: rank equal description at top. See mattcg/language-tags#4

0.3.2¶

Upgrade to https://github.com/mattcg/language-subtag-registry/releases/tag/v0.3.11
Added wheel config
Fixed bug under windows: opening data files using utf-8 encoding.

0.3.1¶

Upgrade to https://github.com/mattcg/language-subtag-registry/releases/tag/v0.3.8

0.3.0¶

Upgrade to https://github.com/mattcg/language-subtag-registry/releases/tag/v0.3.6

Simplify output of __str__ functions. The previous json dump is assigned to the repr function.

nlbe = tags.tags('nl-Latn-BE')
> print(nlbe)
'nl-Latn-BE'
> print(nlbe.language)
'nl'
> print(nlbe.script)
'Latn'

0.2.0¶

Adjust language, region and script properties of Tag. The properties will return language_tags.Subtag.Subtag instead of a list of string subtags

> print(tags.tag('nl-BE').language)
'{"subtag": "nl", "record": {"Subtag": "nl", "Suppress-Script": "Latn", "Added": "2005-10-16", "Type": "language", "Description": ["Dutch", "Flemish"]}, "type": "language"}'
> print(tags.tag('nl-BE').region)
'{"subtag": "be", "record": {"Subtag": "BE", "Added": "2005-10-16", "Type": "region", "Description": ["Belgium"]}, "type": "region"}'
> print(tags.tag('en-mt-arab').script)
'{"subtag": "arab", "record": {"Subtag": "Arab", "Added": "2005-10-16", "Type": "script", "Description": ["Arabic"]}, "type": "script"}'

0.1.1¶

Added string and Unicode functions to make it easy to print Tags and Subtags.
> print(tags.tag('nl-BE')) '{"tag": "nl-be"}'
Added functions to easily select either the language, region or script subtags strings of a Tag.
> print(tags.tag('nl-BE').language) ['nl']

0.1.0¶

Initial version