RE: IDNA reference

> From John C Klensin
>
>> http://unicode.org/reports/tr46/ details a good transition strategy, 
>> but I wonder how one could work that into iri-bis.
>
> TR46 (which is not yet a stable reference since the text is still under review
>  and may change yet again), details a transition strategy.  But it is one that
>  does not have IETF consensus, partially because it posits a much slower
> transition to allow for circumstances that are either very low frequency
>  or that represented abuses even under pre-IDNA2008 standards and
> best practices.   Let's not make things more confusing by trying
> to reference it as if it were the only reasonable approach to the
>  situation.

John and all,
There is apparently some confusion concerning the status of UTS #46 (commonly called 'tr46'). The first version of that specification is not "under review"; it was released on 2010-08-06, shortly after IDNA2008. Except for editorial work the document was stable many months before.  However, because it normatively references IDNA2008, the release of UTS
#46 was delayed until after IDNA2008 was released.
 
What may be causing confusion is that there is a newer version of the document, version 6.0, that is available for public review. The Unicode Standard periodically has new version released with new characters; the 6.0 version is planned for mid-October. Each release of UTS #46 maintains compatibility with the previous release, but has new data tables for the new characters in Unicode.
 
As to the need for UTS #46: The Unicode consortium had been reviewing the progress of IDNA2008 from the beginning. IDNA2008 ended up being not fully backwards compatible with IDNA2003. The membership of the consortium, which includes major browser and search engine vendors considered it necessary to have a transition mechanism for client software to handle the incompatibles during a transitional period. It is true that the membership expects the transition to be slow because it will require that not only the software providers update their products, but also that the users update their software.
 
The view presented by UTS #46 does not claim to represent all opinions and to be the only approach, but it represents a position endorsed by many software vendors and having it referenced in the IRI document would be beneficial to the readers of that specification.
 
Michel Suignard
Unicode Secretary
PS Mark Davis is on vacation, that's why I am answering for the consortium this time

Received on Thursday, 9 September 2010 17:23:36 UTC