The Unicode Consortium has released a proposed update for UTS #46, Unicode IDNA Compatibility Processing, Version 6.0.1. This update is intended to make it easier for implementations to both support IDNA2008, and use the mappings in UTS #46. Those mappings allow implementations to meet user expectations for handling uppercase and lowercase, and other character variants, and maintain compatibility with IDNA2003. The proposed data is found in: http://www.unicode.org/Public/idna/6.0.1/

The proposed draft does not change the UTS #46 status or mapping data for Unicode 6.0 characters; instead, it adds new informative fields to the data file and the conformance test file, fields that provide information as to which characters are allowed under IDNA2008. Because UTS #46 is targeted at client software such as browsers, the conformance tests do not check for the CONTEXTO conditions of IDNA2008, which are optional for client software.

Feedback on the proposed draft is welcome. Of particular interest are independent mechanical verification of the new field values, and feedback as to whether it would be useful to add checks for the CONTEXTO conditions to the conformance tests.

Details of the Public Review Issue are on the following web page:

http://www.unicode.org/review/

Review periods for the new items close on January 31, 2011.

If you have comments for official UTC consideration, please post them by submitting your comments through our feedback & reporting page:

http://www.unicode.org/reporting.html

If you wish to discuss issues on the Unicode mail list, then please use the following link to subscribe (if necessary). Please be aware that discussion comments on the Unicode mail list are not automatically recorded as input to the UTC. You must use the reporting link above to generate comments for UTC consideration.

http://www.unicode.org/consortium/distlist.html