[Gen-art] LC review: draft-ietf-idnabis-bidi-06.txt

[Vint Cerf]

thanks Joel - we will work on resolving these matters - as you see  
some of the editors have already engaged.

v

On Oct 5, 2009, at 10:43 AM, Joel M. Halpern wrote:

> I have been selected as the General Area Review Team (Gen-ART)
> reviewer for this draft (for background on Gen-ART, please see
> http://www.alvestrand.no/ietf/gen/art/gen-art-FAQ.html ).
>
> Please resolve these comments along with any other Last Call comments
> you may receive.
>
> Document: draft-ietf-idnabis-bidi-06.txt
>     Right-to-left scripts for IDNA
> Reviewer: Joel M. Halpern
> Review Date: 5-Oct-2009
> IETF LC End Date: 14-Oct-2009
> IESG Telechat date: N/A
>
> Summary: This document is nearly ready for publication as a proposed
> standard.
> There is one comment I have marked as Major.  I presume that the  
> actual
> problem is not a defect in the intent of the spec, but a defect in  
> this
> readers understanding.  Presuming such, I would ask that clarifying  
> text
> be added.
>
> Major issues:
> In section 2, when describing the rules for what is allowed in labels,
> CS is allowed in labels.  It is not allowed to start RTL labels.  This
> looks fine, until I realized that CS includes ".", which I am pretty
> sure is not allowed in a label.
> This gets further complicated in section 3, when talking about "The
> Character Trouping requirement", the text talks about "Delimiterchars"
> being CS, WS, or ON.  A parenthetical then says "They are not  
> allowed in
> domain labels."
> Since the normative text said that CS is allowed, there seems to be a
> problem.
>
> Minor issues:
> Rule 6 in section 2 talks about the requirements on the termination of
> an LTR (left-to-right) label.  This requirement is much tighter than
> just "don't end with an RTL character", since rule 5 already said  
> "don't
> use any RTL characters."
> However, the non-normative introductory text says roughly that this
> document does not put constraints on labels which do not use RTL  
> characters.
> My guess, as a person who is neither a DNS expert nor a Unicode  
> expert,
> is that rules 6 is not a new rule.
> If rule 6 is equivalent to existing rules in other documents,  
> shouldn't
> there be an explanation of the fact that it is a restatement of  
> existing
> rules?  If it is not just a restatement, then how can you get away  
> with
> it in this document?
>
> At the end of section 2, there is a reference to LDH-labels.  That is
> the only occurrence of the string LDH in the document.  I presume it  
> is
> a typo for something?
>
>
>
> Nits/editorial comments:
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