Yeah, I realized that just after I posted my reply. As usr1106 mentioned, the solution would be to always use square brackets. It would take up more space, but

Yeah, I realized that just after I posted my reply. As usr1106 mentioned, the solution would be to always use square brackets. It would take up more space, but I think it would still be better for at least two reasons: • Even with the brackets, it always takes the same or fewer keypresses (no need to press shift). • It's easier to tell when the address starts and ends. This is helpful when you get into odd addresses like "xxxx::xxxx.192.168.123.234", or "::1", or "::". The versions [xxxx--xxxx.192.168.123.234], [--1], and [--] look nicer and more obvious, at least to me. But of course this is all silly to go over now, decades after the decision. We'll save these changes for IPv8! :-P