At 01:15 PM 7/16/02 -0400, Keith Moore wrote:
> Something else that makes me feel very uneasy about the current draft is
> the way it defines what constitutes a valid IDN in terms of algorithms
> described in two separate documents. This feels to me like putting the
> cart before the horse: I think this (i.e. what constitutes a valid IDN) is
> a fundamental idea which needs a crisp, easily understood description so
> that (for example) any future developments to embed IDNs directly into DNS
> don't get lumbered with legacy ACE code simply to determine what is a valid
> IDN.
actually for the sake of backward compatibility it will probably be
necessary to restrict "native" IDNs to the set that than be encoded in ACE.
so defining valid IDNs in terms of ACE actually makes some sense.
I accept that going forward, IDNs should probably be a subset of names
supported by ACE. I didn't mean to say they should be a superset.
My comment was aimed at the way the allowed form is specified with
reference to the ACE algorithms. I think it should be possible to define a
reasonably simple free-standing description of what constitutes an IDN (to
be simple, such a description may have to be slightly more restrictive than
that allowed by the ACE algorithm).
#g
-------------------
Graham Klyne
<GK(_at_)NineByNine(_dot_)org>