Re: Question for DNS propronents?

At 01:34 PM 6/14/95 -0400, Michael Mealling wrote:
>How do you deal with information spaces and server hierarchies that
>don't correspond to actual DNS name/server hierarchies?
>
>For example, on our campus our Grants and Contracts department handles
>documents that are 'owned' by other departments. This information hierarchy
>is completely unrelated and almost completely opposite of how our
>DNS server/name tree is organized.

I share Michael's concerns on this point. I too require URNs to provide 
me with a level of indirection between the network name space and the 
resource name space (not provided by URLs). Having a resource name space
that is not based on the network name space is key for the applications 
and services we are implementating since it permits certain solutions in
terms of security, replication, and fault-tolerance that we cannot achieve
today using URLs (even URLs that would "live forever").

I don't know what the current status of the agenda is (do we still only
have one session?), but given the number of different proposals on URNs 
and the perception that the group needs to concentrate its efforts more, 
it does not seem unreasonable to me to spend most of the session focusing
on the various URN proposals and a plan for making some sort of progress
in this area.

Personally, I do not think we will come up with a single solution that 
combines all the proposals and I think even if we did, such a solution would
probably be worse than any one of the given proposals. So what I would 
suggest is that perhaps instead of trying to focus on converging the
solutions maybe we focus on interoperability for now (even if it's 
only among some of the proposals and not all) at the syntax and protocol
level. Based on my reading of the proposals I think this doable. What do
other folks (especially those with proposals) think about this?


Roxana

---
Roxana Bradescu                             email: roxanab@attmail.com
Information Services Architecture Dept.       tel: 1+908-949-2002
AT&T Bell Labs                                fax: 1+908-949-8569

Received on Wednesday, 14 June 1995 17:24:25 UTC