add schema and Python for countries

[chadwhitacre]

⬑ #3994

⬑ #3976

← #3998 — #4000 →

Punchlist

• remove code3 and name fields: add schema and Python for countries #3999 (comment)
• take implement UI for working with national identities #4008 on board
• remake against master once implement symmetric encryption #3998 lands → Add countries #4027

[chadwhitacre]

Discovered in #4005 that the official country names aren't suitable for display. E.g., "United States of America (the)" should be "United States" or "the United States" depending on context.

[chadwhitacre]

Actually, it turns out that we already have good names in locale.countries ! 👍

So do we need the names in the countries table at all? Flags (788d92d), Babel, and pretty much everything I'm finding use the two-letter country codes. Should we simplify down to a single column? Will @kaguillera let us use the 2-letter country code as the primary—and only—key?

[kaguillera]

Yes...that is cool if that is what everything uses

[chadwhitacre]

Yes...that is cool if that is what everything uses

Hah! :D Well, on the other hand, this would mean updating all of the subsequent PRs that depend on country_id.

[kaguillera]

I would suggest that we do that now before we have to do that further down the line...is that difficult or too much work??

[chadwhitacre]

@kaguillera I think we're okay with our own id field, and alpha-2 as a separate field. Do you see anything actively bad about that approach?

[kaguillera]

No...I am more inclined to that approach.

[chadwhitacre]

Rebased on #3998 at 049bd48, previous head was fd1ca95.

[chadwhitacre]

We can probably drop the name field and maybe even code3 since we'll be using code2 to index into Babel for names. We'll do the same for flags, and likely any other purpose in the foreseeable future. Holding name especially in our database seems redundant and confusing, since we're not actually using that data in the UI as one might expect.

[chadwhitacre]

Okay, I roughed in #4008. We should look through that for insight on changes we may want to make here—it may make sense to use code2 more thoroughly after all.

[chadwhitacre]

Okay, removed name and code3 in 8a65cdf. We're not using name anywhere, and code3 was only used in the database. @kaguillera and I decided to keep the separate id field on principle. ☺️

[chadwhitacre]

Remade as #4027.