RFC 4185: National and Local Characters for DNS Top Level Domain (TLD) Names
In plain English — editorial summary, not part of the RFC
In the context of work on internationalizing the Domain Name System (DNS), there have been extensive discussions about "multilingual" or "internationalized" top level domain names (TLDs), especially for countries whose predominant language is not written in a Roman-based script. This document reviews some of the motivations for such domains, several suggestions that have been made to provide needed functionality, and the constraints that the DNS imposes. It then suggests an alternative, local translation, that may solve a superset of the problem while avoiding protocol changes, serious deployment delays, and other difficulties. The suggestion utilizes a localization technique in applications to permit any TLD to be accessed using the vocabulary and characters of any language. It is not restricted to language- or country-specific "multilingual" TLDs in the language(s) and script(s) of that country. This memo provides information for the Internet community.
Document record
- Document ID
- RFC4185
- Published
- October 2005
- Authors
- J. Klensin
- Status
- INFORMATIONAL
- Stream
- INDEPENDENT
- Area
- —
- Pages
- 19
- Also known as
- —
Topics
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