4 countries cleared hurdle for non-Latin Web names

Egypt, Russia, Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates is the first country to win approval for the initial Internet address is written entirely in their native script.

Since their creation in the 1980s, the Internet domain names have been limited to 26 characters in the Latin alphabet used in English, and 10 numbers and dashes. Technical tricks have been used to allow parts of the Internet address to use other scripts, but until now, must use the suffix-37 characters.

Announcement from Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Number, known as ICANN, opening the way for the entire domain name that will appear in Cyrillic or Arabic in the middle of this year. Applications to string in another language which delayed.

That means Internet users with little or no knowledge of English no longer need to type Latin characters to access the Web sites targeting Russian or Arabic speakers. Although search engines can sometimes help people achieve this, the company still need to enter Latin characters in the ad.

Users may still need to Latin characters e-mail address, however, as engineers merampungkan Internet standards for e-mail application that can understand all of the domain name in Cyrillic or Arabic.

ICANN gave initial approval to the country after four years of debate and trial non-Latin name. Demand for them has increased throughout the world as the expanding Internet use among people from different languages.

Some countries have issued some non-Latin domain name script - just use the suffix latin characters. But Egypt, Russia, Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates did not, said Tina Dam, senior director for ICANN Domain Name internationalization program.

For three Arabic-speaking countries, there will be too much confusion because their language is written right to left, while the Latin useful left to right. Russian, is a concern that Latin and Cyrillic characters look too similar and will create confusion if mixed in a single Internet address.

Four countries have now formally requested the suffix, ICANN and the hall must be signed. Is now expected that the ICANN staff has cleared the proposed suffix to ensure they will not cause technical problems or confusion with the Latin language is the domain name.

Their endings are:

• The equivalent of "Egyptian" in Arabic.

• "RF" for the Russian Federation, which is written in Cyrillic.

• The Arabic equivalent to "AlSaudiah," short for Saudi Arabia.

• "Emirates" written in Arabic for the UAE.

All four countries will maintain their current two-letter Latin suffix - ". For example" to Egypt, ". Ru" for Russia, ". Sa" and to Saudi Arabia. "Ae" for Emirates.

ICANN received applications from 16 countries in eight languages since mid of last November. Office will not release details about those who are still being studied.