Re: Volunteer needed to serve as IANA charset reviewer

[John C Klensin <[e-mail]>]

(IETF list removed, since this is about to become specialized)

--On Wednesday, 06 September, 2006 11:04 -0700 Ted Hardie
<[e-mail]> wrote:

> The Applications Area is soliciting volunteers willing to
> serve as the IANA charset reviewer.  This position entails
> reviewing charset registrations submitted to IANA in
> accordance with the procedures set out in RFC 2978.  It
> requires the reviewer to monitor discussion on the
> ietf-charsets mailing list (moderating it, if necessary); it
> also requires that the reviewer interact with the registrants
> and IANA on the details of the registration.  There is
> currently a small backlog, and it will be necessary to work to
> resolve that backlog during the initial period of the
> appointment.
>...

Perhaps the need for a new volunteer in this area is the time to
ask a broader question: 

At the time 2978 (and its predecessor, 2278) were defined, there
were a large number of charsets in heavy use and there was some
general feeling in the implementer community that, despite the
provisions of RFC 2277, Unicode/ISO 10646 were not quite ready.
Although we probably still have some distance to go (the issues
with my net-Unicode draft may be illustrative), I wonder if we
are reaching the point at which a stronger "use Unicode on the
wire" recommendation would be in order.   The implications of
such a recommendation would presumably include a 2978bis that
made the requirements for registration of a new charset _much_
tougher, e.g., requiring a demonstration that the then-current
version of Unicode cannot do the relevant job and/or evidence
that the newly-proposed charset is needed in deployed
applications.

This question is motivated, not by a strong love for Unicode,
but by the observation that RFC 2277 requires it and that the
IETF is shifting toward it in a number of areas.   More options
and possibilities for local codings that are not generally known
and supported do not help with interoperability; perhaps it is
time to start pushing back.

And that, of course, would dramatically change the work of the
charset reviewer by reducing the volume but increasing the
amount of evaluation to be done.

     john