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I have given some thought to how to handle/display domain names that are in a right to left script such as Arabic. After some thought and experimentation I think that each label of a domain name should be bidi isolated.
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<div class="">Lets take a 2 level domain name: 2ndLevelD.TLD where each label is written in a Right to Left Script.</div>
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<div class="">In a Left to Right paragraph/document I want the ordering to be 2ndLevelD.TLD</div>
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<div class="">In a Right to Left paragraph/document I want the ordering to be TLD.2ndLevelD</div>
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<div class="">Using bidi isolation this can be achieved. In the case of html5 one can use the bidi isolate tag <bdi></div>
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<div class="">So, I now write my domain name in html5 as</div>
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<div class=""><bdi>2ndLevelD</bdi>.<bdi>TLD</bdi></div>
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<div class="">I then experimented with the html dir attribute and flipped the whole document between dir="ltr" and dir="rtl" and it gave me the results I wanted as above.</div>
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<div class="">I need to think a bit more about the possible permutations of the local part of an email address but if it is a single word then the following works</div>
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<div class="">eg</div>
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<div class=""><bdi>email</bdi>@<bdi>2ndLevelD</bdi>.<bdi>TLD</bdi></div>
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<div class="">I believe that using bidi isolates leads to easier to comprehend domain names/email addresses for both Left to Right readers and Right to Left readers.</div>
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<div class="">So, for example, a Left to Right reader would see a domain name 2ndLevelD.TLD and one can easily comprehend the ordering is from minor to major from Left to Right. The text in each label is though Right to Left</div>
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André Schappo</div>
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