< draft-andrews-dns-ascii-00.txt   draft-andrews-dns-ascii-01.txt >
Mark Andrews Mark Andrews
INTERNET DRAFT CSIRO INTERNET DRAFT CSIRO
Expires: September 1996 March 1996 Expires: September 1996 May 1996
Updates RFC-1035
ASCII Encoding for Domain Names ASCII Encoding for Domain Names
draft-andrews-dns-ascii-00.txt draft-andrews-dns-ascii-01.txt
1. Status of This Memo 1. Status of This Memo
This document is an Internet Draft. Internet Drafts are working This document is an Internet Draft. Internet Drafts are working
documents of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), its Areas, documents of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), its Areas,
and its Working Groups. Note that other groups may also distribute and its Working Groups. Note that other groups may also distribute
working documents as Internet Drafts. working documents as Internet Drafts.
Internet Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six Internet Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six
months. Internet Drafts may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by months. Internet Drafts may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by
other documents at any time. It is not appropriate to use Internet other documents at any time. It is not appropriate to use Internet
Drafts as reference material or to cite them other than as a "working Drafts as reference material or to cite them other than as a "working
draft" or "work in progress." draft" or "work in progress."
Please check the 1id-abstracts.txt listing contained in the internet- Please check the 1id-abstracts.txt listing contained in the internet-
drafts Shadow Directories to learn the current status of any Internet drafts Shadow Directories to learn the current status of any Internet
Draft. Draft.
2. Abstract 2. Abstract
At the protocol level, DNS domain names and records may contain [RFC 1035 Section 5.1] describes how to encode domain names as
arbitrary binary data. There is not however a standard way of character strings. It however allows non printable characters to be
representing these domains as ASCII strings. This RFC describes how used. It also allows for encodings of text files which would not
to encode domain names as a single ASCII string containing no white survive intact ftp ASCII mode transfers, different end of line
space. conventions. This document addresses these problems by stating where
octal escapes MUST be used.
While a applications MUST continue to read the full range as
expressed by [RFC 1035 5.1]. They MUST emit only this selected
subset.
3. Encoding 3. Encoding
Octets within the follow ranges are encoded as backslash followed by Octets within the follow ranges are encoded as backslash followed by
three octal digits, 0x00 - 0x08, 0x0b - 0x0c, 0x0e - 0x1f, 0x7f - three octal digits, 0x00 - 0x20, 0x7f - 0xff.
0xff.
e.g. e.g.
0x00, \000 0x00, \000
0x1f, \177 0x1f, \177
0xff, \377 0xff, \377
Period (".") when NOT used as a domain separator is encoded as the Period (".") when NOT used as a domain separator is encoded as the
sequence backslash period, e.g. "\.". Un-escaped periods indicate sequence backslash period, e.g. "\.". Un-escaped periods indicate
label separators. label separators.
Backslash ("\") is encoded as two consecutive backslashes, e.g. "\\". Backslash ("\") is encoded as two consecutive backslashes, e.g. "\\".
The follow are special encoding for particular characters. Double quotes ('"') should always be represented as backslash quote
as a common nameserver implementation mis-parses strings containing
quotes, e.g. '\"'.
0x09, "\t", Horizontal Tab Semi-colon (";") should always be encoded as backslash semi-colon
0x0a, "\n", Newline otherwise it will be interpreted as a comment. e.g. "\;".
0x0d, "\r", Carriage Return
0x20, "\s", Space Space may be a literal space when the string is enclosed by double
quotes.
All other characters represent their literal ASCII encoding eighth All other characters represent their literal ASCII encoding eighth
bit not set. bit not set.
4. Security 4. Security
This draft introduces no known security problems. It may however This draft introduces no known security problems. It may however
remove some latent security problems in applications where the remove some latent security problems in applications where the
encoding is NOT reversible leading to unexpected changes in domain encoding is NOT reversible leading to unexpected changes in domain
names. names.
5. Author's Address 4. References
[RFC-1035]
P. Mockapetris, ``DOMAIN NAMES - IMPLEMENTATION AND
SPECIFICATION'', RFC-1035, ISI, November 1987.
6. Author's Address
Mark Andrews Mark Andrews
CSIRO CSIRO
Division of Mathematics and Statistics Division of Mathematics and Statistics
Locked Bag 17 Locked Bag 17
North Ryde NSW 2113 North Ryde NSW 2113
AUSTRALIA AUSTRALIA
Mark.Andrews@dms.csiro.au [MA88] Mark.Andrews@dms.csiro.au [MA88]
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