Subject: Re: [iucg] Mapping and Variants

From: JFC Morfin <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 10 Mar 2009 16:20:06 +0100

At 09:06 10/03/2009, Michael Everson wrote:
>You know, last night I sent an IM to Cary:
>
>"I don't know why I remain on the IDNA list. Any time I say anything
>it gets ignored."
>
>Cary responded that he felt that both statements were true for
>everyone on the list.
>
>And these decisions will help run the internet....
>
>Dejectedly,
>Michael

+1

However, I feel the problem is with the matter itself 
(multilinguistics) we actually discover as part of the discipline of 
optimising the support of (linguistic) diversity. This compex 
systemic calls for reticular thinking. Poking into one direction and 
then another (variants, budling, numerics, eszett, 
capitals/upper-cases, ascii to greek, etc.) cannot lead anywere, and 
moreover not to a consensus.

There are thefore one way of thinking (metaductive, cf. infra) and 
two ways to consistently approach the issue:

- from the inside : we first need to make a "meta cartography" of the 
problem we face. The first difficuty are the RFC and the language 
description systems : because they are not designed to permit an easy 
modelling. Then we need to model the domain names themselves and 
languages: what are they, what do we want them to be, or support.

- from the ouside : we need to consider where the domain name system 
belongs : what is its exotem. Then to consider how such an exotem is 
built, encapsualtes, and constrains our "meta map". And to make sure 
the DNS keep being coherent, either a part it, or as the core of it.

"metaductive", means this three steps thinking: building the metamap, 
studying and playing with its model, resolving down practical 
coherent decisions. This is very different from the inductive and 
deductive debate we have (what can I do with what I have, how do I 
support this, and then that, ...).

 From the inside is by nature subjective (to the IETF in this case), 
so it may be easier to peope having a good command of RFCs (the first 
target of IDNA is to stay coherent with former RFCs). From the 
outside is by nature more objective as far as the concerned system is 
considered, this is my own way of thinking (I am not borne with the 
Internet). But both ways need to meet, so to clearly define their 
road-maps and mutually understand/cooperate with vision/information.

jfc