National and Local Characters for DNS Top Level Domain Names

Abstract

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.

Abstract as published in the RFC, via rfc-editor.org.

What “Informational” means

Published for the general information of the community. It does not define an IETF standard and carries no standards-track status.