RE: Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs) in progress

> -----Original Message-----
> From: public-i18n-core-request@w3.org 
> [mailto:public-i18n-core-request@w3.org] On Behalf Of Daniel 
> Dardailler
> Sent: 23 October 2007 13:42
...
> Not to mention that URLs are supposed to be opaque..

I'm not so sure of that.  I just purchased the rishida.net domain because I was sick and tired of trying to get people to type in http://people.w3.org/rishida/photos/ correctly over the phone - much less remember it when they get back to their computer.  rishida.net/photos/ on the other hand is a cynch.

I'm constantly spelling out or writing out the URI of my home page for other people, and I'm glad I don't have to do it in some other language, never mind a different script like Greek or Cyrillic.

RI

============
Richard Ishida
Internationalization Lead
W3C (World Wide Web Consortium)
 
http://www.w3.org/International/
http://rishida.net/blog/
http://rishida.net/

 
 

> To: Martin Duerst
> Cc: Najib Tounsi; 'WWW International'; W3C Offices; 
> public-i18n-core@w3.org
> Subject: Re: Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs) in progress
> 
> 
> Hello Martin, all
> 
> ICANN heard/hears very well the complaints of those who say 
> they are taking too much time to i18nize DNS, not to mention 
> localize it, so I'm not sure adding our own critics would 
> help. I've always been told that the tests were necessary and 
> long because of the paramount importance of the root 
> integrity, which I have a hard time pushing against 
> personnally since I pushed for more QA at W3C from day one 
> (at the price of speed, clearly) to ensure better testing of 
> our specs.
> 
> The real issue today is the policy debate for creating new 
> TLDs by the dozen, and whether or not the system will scale 
> right away in the IDN space. Note that this debate alone in 
> gTLD space, without IDN complications, took that long to 
> actually start moving again. Another issue is the 
> translation/transposition of country code names for ccTLD, 
> which wasn't looking good - as far as a standard is concerned 
> - on the ISO side last year.
> 
> People need to really understand that IDNs are not free-4-all 
> Unicode strings, and that DNS in its current state is not 
> designed with that in mind (search for John Klensin analysis 
> on that point). IMO, IDNs, like TLDs in general, are 
> identifiers akin vehicle license plates, with the same 
> cross-community border interop issues - and maybe the same 
> solution (e.g. ascii subset being used in a lot of regions). 
> 
> Speaking of reasons why URNs aren't opaque, I also wonder if 
> people have thought carefully of the print-digital interface 
> problem we're facing with IDNs becoming popular (I remember 
> talking with Richard about that) and no Unicode familiarity 
> in the masses (e.g. I know how to enter Γρ.αφ in my computer 
> even though I don't have a greek keyboard, but my daughter 
> doesn't - OK my wife does too, but it's a special case :)
> 
> 
> Do you by any chance know which consortia or ISO group is 
> currently or has worked on licence plate normalisation ? How 
> did they solve their I18N issues, and on which ground ? 
> Police Interop comes first ?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Martin Duerst wrote:
> > Hello Daniel,
> > 
> >  From my reading of Najib's mail, especially the "Yet 
> another breaking 
> > of open doors?", it seems that in Najib's opinion, the real 
> IDN issue 
> > with ICANN is that they drag their feet, now for years, in 
> introducing 
> > non-ASCII TLDs, and with the recent announcement, they just 
> have found 
> > a way to extend dragging their feet for another few months at least.
> > 
> > I would have to fully and completely agree with the above opinion.
> > 
> > I wonder what's the best way to tell this to ICANN, maybe 
> you can give 
> > us some advice?
> > 
> > Regards,   Martin.
> > 
> > At 01:54 07/10/23, Daniel Dardailler wrote:
> >> Najib, and other with IDN experience, I encourage you to 
> send back your comments on IDN real issues to ICANN and the 
> IDN groups there.
> >>
> >> Najib Tounsi wrote:
> >>> FYI. Good News
> >>> Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (Icann) is 
> >>> speeding up their work to introduce Internationalized 
> Domain Names 
> >>> (IDNs). Icann has published a call for test on this issue. see 
> >>> http://www.icann.org/announcements/announcement-15oct07.htm
> >>> The tests are targeted toward 'full' IDNs, i.e. with TLDs in 
> >>> non-Latin scripts such as Arabic, Chinese, Cyrilic, Greek and 
> >>> others. Among other things, the tests aim essentially to
> >>> (1) "know how the URL displays in browsers" and
> >>> (2) "How this impacts the root zone"
> >>> I would like to add two comments:
> >>> About the point (1), the W3C I18N WG have already carried 
> out a series of tests on how IDNs are displayed in browsers. 
> Results are discussed in:
> >>> http://www.w3.org/International/tests/results/results-idn-IDNs
> >>> and
> >>> 
> http://www.w3.org/International/tests/results/results-rtl-idn-displa
> >>> y
> >>> (for IDNs with RTL scripts)
> >>> About (2), technically there should be no problem, since IDNs are 
> >>> converted to punicode, an ASCII equivalent string, before 
> being sent 
> >>> to DNS. Moreover, ICANN have already done a similar test in 
> >>> http://www.icann.org/announcements/announcement-4-07mar07.htm
> >>> to be sure "for prudence"  if in presence of TLDs 
> expressed in punicode, "DNS system as a  whole do not behave 
> differently from its normal behaviour."
> >>> Yet another breaking of open doors?
> >>> Any other comment?
> >>> Best,
> >>> Najib
> >>>
> > 
> > 
> > #-#-#  Martin J. Du"rst, Assoc. Professor, Aoyama Gakuin University
> > #-#-#  http://www.sw.it.aoyama.ac.jp       
> mailto:duerst@it.aoyama.ac.jp     
> > 
> > 
> > 
> 
>

Received on Thursday, 25 October 2007 16:50:21 UTC