Re: Combining characters (was: Re: [idn] hostname historyhell)

["Tim Langdell" <tim@xtns.net>]

Vint,

Thank you. Might you possibly give us a little more insight into how you
feel about the direction the discussion is going? And perhaps more of your
thoughts on the issue(s)?

Tim

----- Original Message -----
From: "vint cerf" <vinton.g.cerf@wcom.com>
To: <idn@ops.ietf.org>
Sent: Thursday, November 22, 2001 1:13 PM
Subject: Re: Combining characters (was: Re: [idn] hostname historyhell)


> Eric, et al,
>
> I have been observing the vigorous discussion and
> appreciate the hard work going on here.
>
> A key element is the purpose for domain names. Are they
> just host names or are they labels into information space?
> Of course their origin is the former but they seem to have
> morphed into something rather more elaborate.
>
> The discussion you are having is very important both for
> the future of Internet applications and generally for the
> stability and consistency of the DNS itself.
>
> Vint
>
> At 10:33 AM 11/22/2001 -0600, Eric A. Hall wrote:
>
> >"Eric A. Hall" wrote:
> >
> >> The specific concern I had is already addressed in nameprep so there
> >> is no need for the exception.
> >
> >What I am concerned with is the use of domain name which consist
> entirely
> >of punctuation, or in this case, which consist entirely of combining
> >marks. These represent a rules problem with the principles behind the
> >"safe-set". EG, we forbid domain names like ````````.com using U+0060,
> but
> >````````.com may be legal if the combining character U+0300 is used
> >instead.
> >
> >I get lost in the shrubbery of specs, so can somebody tell me whether
> or
> >not this is a valid concern? I can't tell for certain what happens at
> the
> >end of nameprep with such a label.
> >
> >If this is a problem, a solution might be to change the prohibition
> >against leading hyphen to a prohibition against leading hyphen and
> >combining characters.
> >
> >--
> >Eric A. Hall
> http://www.ehsco.com/
> >Internet Core Protocols
> http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/coreprot/
>
>
>
>
>