Suggestions about separation and ISO code

[Andy Lipscomb]

There is no shortage of codes for countries. In my programming, I usually use the 3-letter codes of the International Olympic Committee, since what I write is generally sports-related.  But for this purpose, being able to match codes with the CLDR is the most important criterion (other than backward compatibility), and that argues for ISO 2-letter. 


J Andrew Lipscomb, CPA*ABV, ASA

Decosimo Corporate Finance

900 Tallan Building
2 Union Square
Chattanooga, TN 37402
423.756.7100
Fax 423.266.6671
www.dcf.decosimo.com

-----Original Message-----
From: Oscar van Vlijmen [mailto:ovv at hetnet.nl] 
Sent: Mon 27 November 2006 14:21
To: tz at lecserver.nci.nih.gov
Subject: Re: Suggestions about separation and ISO code

> From: Jonas Melian
> Sent: Monday, November 27, 2006 6:21 AM
> To: tz at lecserver.nci.nih.gov
> Subject: Suggestions about separation and ISO code

> 1) To using ISO 3166 3-character country code becasuse is more readable.
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_3166-1
> 
> For any person it's easier to identify a country by the code of 
> 3-letters that by the one of 2-letters.

Internet top level domain names for countries are 2-letter codes, derived from the ISO list. More people know something about the internet country codes than about 3-letter ISO codes.
More or less related are the US Federal Information Processing Standard
(FIPS) 10-4 codes, also 2-letter codes.