Re: [idn] An ignorant question about TC<-> SC

[John C Klensin <klensin@jck.com>]

--On Friday, 26 October, 2001 10:20 -0400 ben <ben@cc-www.com>
wrote:

> Hi John,
> 
>> 
>> For those who want the history, at least as I remember it,
>> read on...
>> 
> 
> Thanks for the history lesson and I now have a much better
> understanding of all the efforts that have gone into this.  So
> I have the same question for you as I do for Martin.  Why
> can't we simply label an IDN with the what language script it
> is in.  In my opinion, it is much more important for an IDN
> user to know "what script the IDN is in" and far less
> important to know "if the IDN will take them to a company or
> goverment or military or organization website".

I'm not sure I understand your question, but I think you are
asking a basic question about the organization of the DNS.
I.e., if we decide languages are really important, why don't we
reorganize things into a language-based hierarchy, rather than a
country-and-function-based one?

The only _technical_ answers are that it would be hard to get
there from here, and that, given the administrative nature of
the DNS delegation structure, finding a single, agreed-upon,
authority for each language would be extremely hard.  There are
also a number of administrative obstacles, not the least of
which is that many people would not agree with your opinion.

I hate to keep saying this, but your question takes me back to
what I think is the basic problem here.  The DNS was designed to
provide identifiers for computer resources, using an
administrative structure that was fairly convenient for those
computer resources.  If we need to find names, or understand
strings, along other dimensions, we are either going to need to
remove the problem from the DNS or we are going to be faced with
tradeoffs among a range of undesirable solutions.

    john