TLS support -- piggybacking on Web PKI

[mcint]

I know dict predates the total ascendant dominance of the web.

/etc/services:194:dict   2628/tcp

What would it take to make a TLS version of the protocol widely available by current server maintainers?

• Interest in Transport Security for dict requests
• Agreement on (if and) how to adopt current WebPKI practices.
• Agreement on a distinct port to use, wanting eventual registration with IANA. (It's remarkable how many fewer services linux ships with than IANA has registered).
  • more elegant that sniffing connection packets, on the same port
• Updates to server and client, to do connection setup.
  • Quality of life goal: Keeping open connections, or caching setup information, to avoid paying full TLS setup overhead on every request.

-- This question does seem a little silly. It seems like a large lift for a protocol mainly maintaining support. Have people written proxies, over other transport protocols or data formats, to allow use of the same clients and servers over a different medium. stunnel might be my minimum viable TLS proxy, but I'm interested beyond services hosted by me.