ISO 860:1996 Terminology work – Harmonization of concepts and terms

It is an ISO

International Organization for Standardization

The International Organization for Standardization , widely known as ISO, is an international standard-setting body composed of representatives from various national standards organizations. Founded on February 23, 1947, the organization promulgates worldwide proprietary, industrial and commercial...

 standard

Standardization

Standardization is the process of developing and implementing technical standards.The goals of standardization can be to help with independence of single suppliers , compatibility, interoperability, safety, repeatability, or quality....

 that deals with the principles which are the basis upon which concept systems can be harmonized and with the development of harmonized terminologies, in order to improve the efficiency

Efficiency

Efficiency in general describes the extent to which time or effort is well used for the intended task or purpose. It is often used with the specific purpose of relaying the capability of a specific application of effort to produce a specific outcome effectively with a minimum amount or quantity of...

 in interlinguistic communication

Communication

Communication is the activity of conveying meaningful information. Communication requires a sender, a message, and an intended recipient, although the receiver need not be present or aware of the sender's intent to communicate at the time of communication; thus communication can occur across vast...

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This standard specifies a methodology for the harmonization of concepts, definitions, terms, concept systems, and term systems. It is a natural extension of ISO 704

ISO 704

ISO 704 - Terminology work—Principles and methodsIt is an ISO standard, which establishes the basic principles and methods for preparing and compiling terminologies both inside and outside the framework of standardization, and describes the links between objects, concepts, and their terminological...

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The standard addresses two types of harmonization: concept harmonization and term harmonization. Concept harmonization means the reduction or elimination of minor differences between two or more closely related concepts. Concept harmonization is not the transfer of a concept system to another language. It involves the comparison and matching of concepts and concept systems in one or more languages or subject fields.

Term harmonization refers to the designation of a single concept (in different languages) by terms that reflect similar characteristics or similar forms. Term harmonization is possible only when the concepts the terms represent are almost exactly the same. The standard contains a flow chart for the harmonization process and a description of the procedures for performing it.

Amendments

ISO 860:2007 specifies a methodological approach to the harmonization of concepts, concept systems, definitions and terms. It applies to the development of harmonized terminologies, at either the nation

Nation

A nation may refer to a community of people who share a common language, culture, ethnicity, descent, and/or history. In this definition, a nation has no physical borders. However, it can also refer to people who share a common territory and government irrespective of their ethnic make-up...

al or international

International

----International mostly means something that involves more than one country. The term international as a word means involvement of, interaction between or encompassing more than one nation, or generally beyond national boundaries...

 level, in either a monolingual or a multilingual context. It replaces: ISO 860:1996