sub show {
    return join('', map { ord($_) > 0x3F ? $_ : sprintf('\\x%02X', ord($_))
                        } split(//, $_[0])) ;
  } ;

  my $hostname = 'much.ado.about.not.alot.org' ;
  my @labels = split(/\./, $hostname) ;
  my $n = scalar(@labels) ;
  my $question = pack("(C/a*)$n C n2", @labels, 0, 1, 1) ;

  print "\"", show($question), "\"\n" ;