From: Michael Everson (everson@evertype.com)
Date: Fri Jul 01 2005 - 13:01:11 CDT
I have sent in the following feedback:
Much in the draft TR 36 is very good, in terms of explanation of the
problem and so on. But I STRONGLY urge caution in the publication of
permitted and unpermitted characters. There is not consensus between
UTC and IETF and ICANN on what the shape of IDN should be. I am NOT
saying that it will take an eternity to achieve such consensus, but I
AM saying that it isn't there yet. In a fortnight in Luxembourg ICANN
is having a meeting where a large number of players in this arena
will be meeting. I urge the UTC not to publish a definitive UTR on
this topic until consensus is achieved.
A specific fault in UTR 36 is that it is just a list of characters.
For IDN to work, language-specific lists need to be coordinated with
such a list of characters. This suggests that proper linguistic
expertise may not have been applied in the drafting of the tables.
For instance, such lists exist for European languages. Such lists do
not exist for many African languages.
A specific fault in
http://www.unicode.org/draft/reports/tr36/data/review.txt is that it
uses unexplained notations. What is "output"? What is
"input-lenient"? Why are these terms used? What is "XID+"?
http://www.unicode.org/draft/reports/tr36/data/review.txt also STILL
does not load characters in Safari.
Please, UTC, do not rush this. More haste less speed. The parties
concerned with this matter include players other than the companies
that make up the UTC. Without broader consensus, the UTR may not be
accepted. But I agree that it is a good place to make the
specification.
-- Michael Everson * * Everson Typography * * http://www.evertype.com
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