Moving Towards Internationalized Domain Names

1
Moving Towards Internationalized Domain Names

• Paul Hoffman
• Internet Mail Consortium
• September 7, 2000

2
What is covered today

• Quick DNS overview
• Update on the IDN Working Group
• IDN proposals
• Transition strategies
• Next steps
• (See conference notes for more details)

3
DNS overview

• Todays host names are a-z, 1-9, and - only,
  and case is ignored in comparisons
• Some other ASCII characters have been further
  restricted (mostly those used in URLs)
• There is a strong desire to allow all common
  naming characters from all scripts in host names

4
Problems with going to IDN

• Although the DNS specification does not restrict
  host names to ASCII, many implementations do, and
  that will cause problems if there is a shift to
  UTF-8 in the protocol
• Some protocols that use the DNS (mail and digital
  certificates, for example), cannot use 8-bit names

5
IDN Working Group status

• New WG web site lthttp//www.i-d-n.netgt
• Many proposals before the WG
• messages within the DNS, and queries/responses
  applications ? DNS
• canonicalization and limitations on characters in
  internationalized names
• No consensus yet, and lots of discussions still
  active

6
Proposals under active discussion

• Main protocols in discussion appear to be IDNE
  (uses EDNS0 to mark binary requests in the DNS)
  and IDNRA (involves no changes to the DNS)
• nameprep is the main proposal for limitations
  and processing

7
Transition strategies

• Will the changes work if only some of the parts
  of the DNS are updated?
• Must prevent any damage to the the current DNS,
  and also must look sensible to novice Internet
  users
• This could be biggest stumbling block for any
  proposal

8
Next steps for the IDN WG

• The working group must focus on a single
  on-the-wire protocol
• That protocol must be bashed heavily by critics
  and supporters to be sure that it will really do
  what it is supposed to
• Also must start defining what types of characters
  are wanted and not wanted in host names