RE: [idn] draft-ietf-idn-requirements-04.txt

[Karlsson Kent - keka <keka@im.se>]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Keith Moore [mailto:moore@cs.utk.edu]
> Sent: Monday, October 09, 2000 2:38 PM
> To: Karlsson Kent - keka
> Cc: idn@ops.ietf.org
> Subject: Re: [idn] draft-ietf-idn-requirements-04.txt 
> 
> 
> > 2) The requirements document MUST NOT presuppose that there is
> >    at all any "ACE" (TES) used for domain names. 
> 
> ACE itself is not a fundamental requirement.  however, ACE is
> very nearly implied by other fundamental requirements, some of

Not so.

> which are not in the requirements document.  among these is the
> need for existing applications and protocols, some of which cannot
> deal with other than ASCII names, to be able to exchange  IDNs
> both within the protocol and between applications and other
> protocols.

This can, at least in principle, and I would hope in practice,
be fulfilled by having a parallel (and manually chosen) ASCII
name for each IDN.  Thus 

	"The protocol MUST NOT allow an IDN to be returned to a requestor
       that requests the IP-to-(old)-domain-name mapping service."

is fine (it could return the parallel (but non-ACE) ASCII name),
whereas

	"If there is only IDN exists, then DNSSEC MUST sign an ACE to
       avoid an empty answer section."

is not fine at all since it sneaks in a requirement for an "ACE"/TES.
(I still don't understand the broken English there, but that is
beside my point.)

		/Kent Karlsson