> As I understand it, this essentially implies that an IDN, or at > least an IDN that might contain RTL characters, is not > interpretable unambiguously unless it appears as part of a > fully-spelled-out URL.
No, it is the converse. > This WG is tasked with internationalizing _domain names_, not > URLs. An acceptable URL solution may also be a requirement, but > that is a side-effect. Understood. However, having these restrictions in domain names is a step towards internationizing URLs, and one without which it would be difficult. Mark __________ http://www.macchiato.com ◄ “Eppur si muove” ► ----- Original Message ----- From: "John C Klensin" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "Mark Davis" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: "Simon Josefsson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; "IETF/IDN WG" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; "Matitiahu Allouche" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Saturday, July 27, 2002 09:20 Subject: Re: [idn] Re: IDN WG Last Call on two major changes to Stringprep > > > --On Saturday, 27 July, 2002 07:51 -0700 Mark Davis > <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > >... > >> During the meeting, I thought that the most straightforward > >> method was > >> to force the periods to be LTR. However, after looking at the > >> results > >> in both a RTL and LTR context, I concluded that Mati's approach > >> would > >> be better. The results both in terms of field order and order > >> within a > >> field would still be determinate. With any complete URL (with > >> http://, ftp://, etc.) it would be easy to recognize the order > >> in context, since the position of those initial letters would > >> show the order. > >> The > >> only bad case would be where the end of the string reversed > >> because of > >> its surroundings, e.g.: > >> > >> Memory: the url http://SOME.LARGE.mixed.CORP.org is > >> the one Display (LTR): the url > >> http://EGRAL.EMOS.mixed.PROC.org is the one Display (RTL): > >> org is the one.PROC.mixed.EGRAL.EMOS//: the url http > >> > >> Thus in flowing text, users would be recommended to bracket > >> any BIDI URL with RLM (or embed the URL). E.g. > >... > > Mark, > > As I understand it, this essentially implies that an IDN, or at > least an IDN that might contain RTL characters, is not > interpretable unambiguously unless it appears as part of a > fully-spelled-out URL. I can't imagine that being acceptable. I > can't even imagine it being acceptable to require that IDNs > appear in URLs at all to be valid. > > To repeat something I seem to need to say in every talk I give > about these issues, > "the web is not the net". > This WG is tasked with internationalizing _domain names_, not > URLs. An acceptable URL solution may also be a requirement, but > that is a side-effect. > > john > > >
