Domain Names in Foreign Languages

We hope you enjoy your visit.

You're currently viewing our forum as a guest. This means you are limited to certain areas of the board and there are some features you can't use. If you join our community, you'll be able to access member-only sections, and use many member-only features such as customizing your profile, sending personal messages, and voting in polls. Registration is simple, fast, and completely free.

Join our community!

If you're already a member please log in to your account to access all of our features:

Domain Names in Foreign Languages
Topic Started: Oct 30 2009, 02:32 PM (177 Views)
Codes Rock	Oct 30 2009, 02:32 PM Post #1
<?php echo 'Codes Rock rocks!'; ?> Posts: 325 Group: Members Member #172,002 Joined: July 18, 2008 I'm Browsing With Firefox 3 My Board URL http://s1.zetaboards.com/ImageTools/	Quote: Finally, the World Wide Web will live up to its name. The decision by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) that Web sites written in Russian, Chinese, Arabic, and other non-ASCII character sets will be able to have their Internet domain names displayed in their own languages truly makes the Web a global worldwide network. For the past 40 years (the Internet turned 40 this week) the Internet and the Web have been the exclusive domain of English language addresses. For non-English speaking countries it has been the real world equivalent to forcing them to use English language stationary. No longer will entire countries be forced to use Latin-based characters and their Web addresses and e-mail addresses will now be as recognizable as their telephone book. The move is being heralded by ICANN as the biggest technical change to the Internet since its birth. more information Do you think domains should be able to be in non-English names? Overall, what's you opinion of this decision?



Moonface	Oct 30 2009, 02:58 PM Post #2
Member Posts: 308 Group: Members Member #133,038 Joined: October 17, 2006 I'm Browsing With Firefox 3 My Board URL http://s10.zetaboards.com/universalgaming	As long as it doesn't end up where web domains turn into those stupid squares because it's some crazy language that a browser or whatever can't determine, then there's really no problem. Most sites that will probably do this won't be in English languages anyway most likely, so I can't see it really causing any hassle. Until people get clever and use random languages to make links that go to joke websites or whatever.



OcelotJay	Oct 30 2009, 09:49 PM Post #3
<3 mine Miaow Posts: 10,510 Group: Members Member #20,669 Joined: June 5, 2004 I'm Browsing With Firefox 3	It makes sense - I'm actually surprised it's taken this long to happen but it's not going to be easy to implement. For many (probably most) in the English-speaking world, it'll probably mean very little. But for those who are fluent in various other languages, there will probably be trouble accessing the ones which English keyboards don't support. Chinese characters, for example; as far as I'm aware, they can only be created using specific font settings (that's how I create & render mine at least - I'm not aware of anything else for a standard keyboard in the UK). They'll have to overcome the issue of being able to shift between languages that render differently with minimal fuss, though I imagine that's second to the main concern of allowing for domains in non-ASCII standard languages. It'll be interesting to see it happen and how it affects the web.



Das	Oct 31 2009, 02:35 AM Post #4
Smells of rich mahogany Posts: 7,054 Group: Members Member #34,712 Joined: November 10, 2004 I'm Browsing With Firefox 3	From a purely selfish perspective, the way it is now is more accessible in that most people using other keyboard layouts understand how to grab English characters while the inverse isn't true. I still have to google "accented a" when I'm doing Spanish homework and I wouldn't even want to try some of the more exotic characters. I am curious if this will make getting characters in other languages easier in terms of either having bigger keyboards, attachments, or a way to fast-swap between language sets.



Moonface	Oct 31 2009, 07:04 AM Post #5
Member Posts: 308 Group: Members Member #133,038 Joined: October 17, 2006 I'm Browsing With Firefox 3 My Board URL http://s10.zetaboards.com/universalgaming	It would be nice if domain hosts could give free translations of domains for those without the character sets or something. I completely overlooked the fact of actual characters used for different languages.



trevormacster1	Nov 6 2009, 05:10 PM Post #6
Member Posts: 75 Group: Members Member #172,290 Joined: July 24, 2008	Yeah that would be nice if you have members in different parts of the world who don't speak english.



Nikkia	Nov 7 2009, 09:00 AM Post #7
Member Posts: 87 Group: Members Member #185,895 Joined: September 28, 2009 I'm Browsing With Firefox 3	This would not affect my members on my boards because boards that are not in English are violating the Terms of Service, if I'm correct. I think this would be a bit difficult, not only for us English-speakers, but for those unfamiliar with English. The barrier between English speakers and foreign languages is just so great. Whereas, most foreigners are taught English, even in their own schools. This may sound selfish, but I think throwing multiple languages into the mix is a bad idea. Edited by Nikkia, Nov 7 2009, 09:01 AM.



Lindsey	Nov 7 2009, 03:02 PM Post #8
<3 Posts: 2,519 Group: Community Moderator Member #91,611 Joined: January 21, 2006 I'm Browsing With Firefox 3	Nikkia Nov 7 2009, 09:00 AM This would not affect my members on my boards because boards that are not in English are violating the Terms of Service, if I'm correct. I think this would be a bit difficult, not only for us English-speakers, but for those unfamiliar with English. The barrier between English speakers and foreign languages is just so great. Whereas, most foreigners are taught English, even in their own schools. This may sound selfish, but I think throwing multiple languages into the mix is a bad idea. But this is applied to domain names, not websites - there are millions of websites that are in another language already. The internet doesn't consist of English-only websites; just domain names... or it used to. I think of this as a "why not?" kind of idea. I won't affect me, so it's not particularly great. But it's cool, nonetheless.



Odlaw	Nov 18 2009, 06:00 PM Post #9
Member Posts: 12 Group: Members Member #186,783 Joined: November 18, 2009 I'm Browsing With Firefox 3 My Board URL http://www.theunitedliterates.com	Lindsey Nov 7 2009, 03:02 PM Nikkia Nov 7 2009, 09:00 AM This would not affect my members on my boards because boards that are not in English are violating the Terms of Service, if I'm correct. I think this would be a bit difficult, not only for us English-speakers, but for those unfamiliar with English. The barrier between English speakers and foreign languages is just so great. Whereas, most foreigners are taught English, even in their own schools. This may sound selfish, but I think throwing multiple languages into the mix is a bad idea. But this is applied to domain names, not websites - there are millions of websites that are in another language already. The internet doesn't consist of English-only websites; just domain names... or it used to. I think of this as a "why not?" kind of idea. I won't affect me, so it's not particularly great. But it's cool, nonetheless. I agree. I think it's a pretty 'eh, whatever works' idea, and I think it's great that ICANN's trying to include the languages...but, this is going to be extremely problematic if domain name providers don't give free translations - in EVERY character set that this new initiative supports. Otherwise you're going to have http://www.zetaboards.com and then the Russian Cyrillic equivalent (not having a Russian keyboard makes it hard to type it) - both up for grabs.



1 user reading this topic (1 Guest and 0 Anonymous)


« Previous Topic · Community Chat · Next Topic »