[webfinger] Webfinger and URI vs IRI

"Paul E. Jones" <paulej@packetizer.com> Mon, 22 July 2013 05:50 UTC

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From: "Paul E. Jones" <paulej@packetizer.com>
To: webfinger@ietf.org
Date: Mon, 22 Jul 2013 01:50:18 -0400
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Cc: "\"Martin J. Dürst\"" <duerst@it.aoyama.ac.jp>
Subject: [webfinger] Webfinger and URI vs IRI
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Folks,

The term URI is used almost exclusively in the WebFinger spec, with IRI
appearing only twice (outside of the reference).  This is because URI is
used in RFC 6415 almost exclusively.  However, RFC 5988 uses the term IRI in
most of the text.  That said, RFC 5988 also says things like the "target IRI
as a URI-Reference" ...

I feel like we have a terminology problem and it's not quite clear to me how
to fix it.  Should we change every instance of URI to IRI?  Should URI be
used in most places, with IRI discussed specifically somewhere?  Or is there
even a need to mention IRI given that IRIs can be converted to URIs?

I would really like to get this right, but it definitely does not look right
now with only one normative use of IRI in section 4.4.4.  Who can help me
with this?

Paul