Subject: Re: Something better than DNS?

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 03 Dec 2006 10:59:53 -0800

John Levine wrote:
> ICANN has not to date dealt very effectively with these issues, but
> they are real issues that will have a great effect on people who use
> the DNS every day, and they're not technical issues, since all of the
> alternatives are equally feasible technically.

At its base, IDN is a technical matter.  That is the realm of the IETF, not 
ICANN.  ICANN can deploy and administer solutions developed in the IETF, but it 
cannot create them.  That's not its job and it's not its skillset.

IDN has undergone protracted IETF work, with problematic results. 
Unfortunately, moving from trivial net-ASCII to something that supports the 
global range of characters, such as Unicode, has been received sustained effort 
for 10-15 years on the Internet, with modest results

So before we assert that one organization, or another, has not dealt effectively 
with these issues, we need to acknowledge that these issues have proved 
remarkably difficult for *anyone* to deal with effectively, at the scale and 
complexity of the Internet.

This is not to suggest that efforts cease, but merely that we accept the 
extensive, diligent effort by bright people has yet to succeed in converting the 
  net to solutions of "these issues".

That means that it will be more productive to focus on understanding and dealing 
with the technical, administrative, operations and human factors difficulties in 
solving the problems, than in declaring any particular organization deficient.

d/

-- 

   Dave Crocker
   Brandenburg InternetWorking
   bbiw.net

_______________________________________________
Ietf mailing list
[email-masked]
https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf

---

From: John L <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 3 Dec 2006 17:23:16 -0200 (BRST)

> ICANN.  ICANN can deploy and administer solutions developed in the IETF, but 
> it cannot create them.  That's not its job and it's not its skillset.

There are both technical issues and non-technical issues.  The technical 
issues of mapping Unicode to DNS are indeed the IETF's problem.  But 
assuming we solve that, there's considerably more to deploying IDNs.

For example, what homograph rules apply to what domains?  Are the rules 
per-TLD or some other granularity?  What are the appropriate rules for 
GTLDs, since they don't have a native language other than the de-facto 
English?  If there are new TLDs with translations of existing TLD names. 
e.g., business in Arabic and Chinese, are these aliases for .COM or .BIZ, 
or are they different?  If people have registered ASCII approximations of 
names, e.g., letters without diacriticals, do they get first crack at the 
correctly spelled IDN with the diacriticals?

Regards,
John Levine, [email-masked], Primary Perpetrator of "The Internet for Dummies",
Information Superhighwayman wanna-be, http://johnlevine.com, Mayor
"I dropped the toothpaste", said Tom, crestfallenly.

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 03 Dec 2006 11:41:00 -0800

-- 

   Dave Crocker

John L wrote:
>> At its base, IDN is a technical matter.  That is the realm of the 
>> IETF, not ICANN.  ICANN can deploy and administer solutions developed 
>> in the IETF, but it cannot create them.  That's not its job and it's 
>> not its skillset.
> 

So, it's probably good that I (later) noted "technical, administrative, 
operations and human factors difficulties"...

The point I am trying to make is that the sorts of issues that ICANN can 
reasonably be expected to deal with are typically the sort that come *after* 
having a viable technical solution.

There seems to be some continuing, serious questions about whether that solution 
yet exists.

Homographic mappings are an example of just how difficult the topic is.  I am 
pretty sure that that is something for the IETF and not ICANN.

At least, I *hope* it is.

Still, it's true that any topic can be politicized, even technical ones.

> e.g., business in Arabic and Chinese, are these aliases for .COM or 
> .BIZ, or are they different?  If people have registered ASCII 
> approximations of names, e.g., letters without diacriticals, do they get 
> first crack at the correctly spelled IDN with the diacriticals?

Every time that ICANN has attempted to dabble in the arena of name conflicts, of 
the type that exist outside the Internet and in the realm of "confusion", it has 
invited more controversy and less solution than most folks desire.

d/
-- 

   Dave Crocker

---

From: Frank Ellermann <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 03 Dec 2006 21:12:59 +0100

John L wrote:
 
> There are both technical issues and non-technical issues.
[...]

BTW, I liked your "travel-sitefinder" statement on behalf of ALAC.   

Frank

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 04 Dec 2006 15:26:40 +0100

> first crack at the correctly spelled IDN with the diacriticals?

In that context, RFC 4690 is thought-provoking.

    Brian