The IDN domain browsers
Been comparing some of the top browsers that support IDN - namely IE7, Firefox and Opera. Each browser handles IDNs differently. IE7 for example resolves an IDN domain in a given language to Punycode by default unless you have added the language to your language settings (or I believe if you have that language version of the browser). Then the IDN domain will resolve to the native character Unicode. Firefox has long supported IDN domains and for a while resolved IDNs to Unicode but this was stopped last year because of spoofing concerns.
Now Firefox uses a whitelist to determine which domain/extension gets resolved to Unicode. Tried a few Unicode .com and .net IDNs in Firefox and they all were resolved to Punycode. Opera appears to resolve all IDNs to Unicode even when entered in Punycode form. Fast browser too.
Considering everything, the favorite of the bunch so far is IE7 (though Opera is a close second), mainly because it seems IDN has been given a lot of attention. Also the way the “A” button appears when an IDN address is accessed in IE is impressive. This button when clicked brings up a window that gives detailed information about the specific IDN. There is also a choice of adding and enabling the languages user preferred. Looking forward to seeing how the browsers develop their IDN functionality as time goes on.
This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 14th, 2006 at 8:16 am and is filed under world wide web. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
