Re: [idn] impacted systems investigation

["Bruce Thomson" <bthomson@fm-net.ne.jp>]

> what protocol extension were you proposing to make sure those Japanese
> domain names did not leave the country through Sendmail?
>
> For better or worse, we only have one Internet.
>

I researched this issue a bit more, and found that RFC1342 allows
the "From:" field of an e-mail to be UTF-8, and that 8-bit-incapable
mail gateways can still be used by using base-64 encoding on
this field, the same as is currently used when the sender's name
is in an 8-bit codeset such as Japanese. So actually, the problem
is not sendmail at all, it is in the recipient's mail software only.
If he doesn't have the latest version, and has no idea who sent the
e-mail, he won't be able to reply.

It is important to consider this issue it its total context. It is difficult
to
work in a foreign language if you are not in the particular country, and
idns are just one small aspect of this.

To work in Japanese, I first need to have Japanese Windows. Yes,
I know you can install language packs, as the guy sitting next to me
does. But basically he is just playing around and can't really use his
system in the language.

Next, you need a Japanese printer. Japanese Office, Pagemaker,
Illustrator, Power Point, or whatever. Take the plunge, do it all
in that language, and suddenly it all comes together into something
quite nice.

I have also been in the position of trying to use Japanese while in
the U.S. An excruciating experience, I must say. I am missing just
too many pieces of what I need to make it work right. People
send me documents that have Japanese fonts I am missing. My
printer isn't really up to spec, etc.

So, my hat is off to those hardy Japanese ex-pats who run in
a Japanese environment overseas, because I realize what they
had to do to get that far, and what they have to put up with if
they have a half-way environment.

Either way, I think these guys can cope with idn e-mail without
any help from us. They will either choose not to use idns in e-mail,
or they will get the apps they need to make it work.

Please remember that although we all may be "one Internet", a
lot of "out-of-band" agreements are needed to inter-operate.
Lawyers commonly use WordPerfect, and that may work well
for their in-house communications, but if I can't read that file
format, they will be wasting time if they send me such a thing.
No protocol can prevent this, just common sense.

Bruce

----- Original Message -----
From: "Harald Alvestrand" <Harald@Alvestrand.no>
To: "Bruce Thomson" <bthomson@fm-net.ne.jp>; <idn@ops.ietf.org>
Sent: Friday, March 09, 2001 11:50 PM
Subject: Re: [idn] impacted systems investigation


> At 15:03 09/03/2001 +0900, Bruce Thomson wrote:
> >Sendmail was also discussed as the source of possible problems.
> >This problem can be eliminated by suggesting that idns not
> >be used in e-mail communications except within the
> >intended country. (see my previous post.)
>
> ouch.
> a random selection of 974 self-declared Japanese that I just happen to
have
> lying around gives:
>
> - 784 .jp addresses
> - 80 .com addresses
> - 15 .net addresses
> - 5 .org addresses
> - 3 .mil addresses
> - 2 .br adresses
>
> the same set gives for the .jp addresses
>
> - 784 in Japan
> - 5 in the US
> - 4 in Korea
> - 3 in China
> - 2 in Thailand
>
> and so on.
>
> what protocol extension were you proposing to make sure those Japanese
> domain names did not leave the country through Sendmail?
>
> For better or worse, we only have one Internet.
>
> --
> Harald Tveit Alvestrand, alvestrand@cisco.com
> +47 41 44 29 94
> Personal email: Harald@Alvestrand.no
>
>
>