[db-wg] Internationalized domain names in the data abase?

Hi Piotr, DB-WG,

> On 6 Nov 2019, at 21:17, Piotr Strzyzewski <Piotr.Strzyzewski at polsl.pl> wrote:
> 
>> DB-WG: should we allow non-ASCII addresses in the RIPE database?
> 
> Do you mean email addresses or street addresses as well?
> 

I mean to continue to allow non-ASCII (i.e. Latin-1 encoded) IDN email addresses, such as the example mentioned. Or, do we automatically encode non-ASCII characters as punycode.

>>> P.S.  Not that anybody should really care, but for this one lone resarcher
>>> it would be maximally convenient if all domain names represented within the
>>> data base were encoded as punycode, where necessary.  In fact, it is my
>>> belief that 99.99% of them already are, which thus renders the "transition"
>>> to that standard essentially pain free.
>>> 
>> 
>> DB-WG: is punycode for domain names a viable alternative for encoding non-ASCII email addresses?
> 
> Works for me.

We can make explicit support for the punycode format, and allows (full) IDN email addresses to be used (as this syntax should be interchangeable with the normal form).

Whois could automatically translate to and from the punycode format, if an IDN format address is encountered.

> 
>> For example, the punycode equivalent abuse at xn--zrich-kva.email is already a valid value for the e-mail (or abuse-c) attribute.
> 
> -- 
> Piotr Strzyżewski

Regards
Ed Shryane
RIPE NCC