[db-wg] Proposal to allow non-ASCII characters in "org-name:", "person:" and "role:" attributes

That sounds like a perfect migration plan.

Thanks!


On 2024 Jan 18 (Thu) at 10:34:21 +0100 (+0100), Edward Shryane via db-wg wrote:
:Dear colleagues,
:
:Based on the discussion regarding UTF-8 in the RIPE database during the interim meeting yesterday, I suggest that we implement support for UTF-8 in the database (i.e. convert the schema and add a flag to allow a client to choose a character set), but we do not allow additional characters for now, pending further DB-WG discussion. Our intention is to lay the groundwork for future support, without breaking existing functionality. If you have any concerns or objections please let me know.
:
:We will now prepare an implementation plan / impact analysis of these changes.
:
:Regards
:Ed Shryane
:RIPE NCC
:
:
:> On 24 Nov 2023, at 10:03, Edward Shryane via db-wg <db-wg at ripe.net> wrote:
:> 
:> Dear colleagues,
:> 
:> Currently the RIPE database only allows a subset of ASCII characters in the "org-name:", "person:" and "role:" attributes, for a few reasons including:
:> 
:> * These attributes are also a look-up key and the Whois protocol does not allow specifying character sets in queries.
:> * RPSL names are ASCII according to RFC2622
:> * Using a normalised name makes the object easier to query
:> * Reading a normalised name is easier to interpret
:> 
:> However there are some drawbacks to forcing names to only use a subset of ASCII characters:
:> 
:> * Organisations, roles and persons cannot use their actual name if it includes characters outside this subset.
:> * Normalisation is not standard, but is an interpretation done by each maintainer, e.g. characters could be excluded or converted in different ways.
:> 
:> Since we support the Latin-1 character set in the RIPE database, I propose we also allow non-ASCII Latin-1 characters in these attributes.
:> 
:> Querying for a name can be done either using the latin-1 characters (proposed) or a normalised, ASCII representation (currently). The normalised version will be generated by Whois and stored in a database index for querying. The primary key will also be generated from the normalised version.
:> 
:> Please let me know your feedback.
:> 
:> Regards
:> Ed Shryane
:> RIPE NCC
:> 
:> ---
:> 
:> Whois attribute verbose description (copied from the help text).
:> 
:> org-name
:> --------
:> Specifies the name of the organisation that this organisation object
:> represents in the RIPE Database. This is an ASCII-only text attribute.
:> The restriction is because this attribute is a look-up key and the
:> whois protocol does not allow specifying character sets in queries.
:> The user can put the name of the organisation in non-ASCII character
:> sets in the "descr:" attribute if required.
:> 
:> A list of 1 to 30 words separated by white space. 
:> A word is made up of ASCII alphanumeric characters and additionally: ][)(._"*@,&:!'`+/-
:> A word may have up to 64 characters and is not case sensitive. 
:> Each word can have any combination of the above characters with no restriction on the start or end of a word.
:> 
:> person
:> ------
:> Specifies the full name of an administrative, technical or zone
:> contact person for other objects in the database.
:> 
:> It should contain 2 to 10 words.
:> A word is made up of ASCII alphanumeric characters and additionally: .`'_-
:> The first word should begin with a letter.
:> At least one other word should also begin with a letter.
:> Max 64 characters can be used in each word.
:> 
:> role
:> ----
:> Specifies the full name of a role entity, e.g. RIPE DBM.
:> 
:> A list of 1 to 30 words separated by white space.
:> A word is made up of ASCII alphanumeric characters and additionally: ][)(._"*@,&:!'`+/-
:> A word may have up to 64 characters and is not case sensitive. 
:> Each word can have any combination of the above characters with no restriction on the start or end of a word.
:> 
:> 
:> -- 
:> 
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