- From: Aaron Swartz <me@aaronsw.com>
- Date: Thu, 2 Aug 2001 22:04:47 -0500
- To: urn-nid@apps.ietf.org
- Cc: uri@w3.org, Sandro Hawke <sandro@w3.org>, Tim Kindberg <timothy@hpl.hp.com>, "Sean B. Palmer" <sean@mysterylights.com>
Request for Comments: xxxx S. B. Palmer Category: Informational A. Swartz August 2001 A "pts" URN Namespace Status of this Memo This memo provides information for the Internet community. It does not specify an Internet standard of any kind. Distribution of this memo is unlimited. Copyright Notice Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2001). All Rights Reserved. Abstract The need for URNs that identify arbitrary resources, are persistent and unique across time and network space, and yet remain easy to create has been evident for quite some time now. This is an attempt at a concrete registration for such a scheme. 1. Introduction This document proposes the "pts" namespace, which enables people that have acquired the right to create these URNs quickly and easily following certain conditions. The namespace specification is for a formal namespace. 2. Specification Template Namespace ID: "pts" requested Palmer and Swartz Informational [Page 1] RFC xxxx A "pts" URN Namespace August 2001 Registration Information: Registration version number: 1 Registration date: 2001-08-02 Declared registrant of the namespace: Name: Aaron Swartz Email address: <mailto:me@aaronsw.com> Declaration of syntactic structure: The syntactic definition of these URNs is:- urn = "urn:" nid ":" authority ":" name Where:- nid = "pts" authority = domain "," date domain = hostname ; [RFC 2396] date = year "-" month year = digitx0 *digit month = digitx0 | "10" | "11" | "12" digit = "0" | digitx0 digitx0 = "1" | "2" | "3" | "4" | "5" | "6" | "7" | "8" | "9" name = *( char [ ":" ] ) char = 1*( unreserved | escaped ) ; [RFC 2396] Examples of syntactically valid URNs under this scheme include:- urn:pts:infomesh.net,2001-05:myterm urn:pts:example.org,2001-05:mything urn:pts:example.org,2001-05:my%20thing urn:pts:purl.org,1998-10:101010001010:86%25%80 urn:pts:sub.mydomain.net,2001-05:myns-Myterm [N.B. all authority components are purely illustrative.] Relevant ancillary documentation: All URNs defined herein conform to [RFC 2141]. The <hostname>, <unreserved> and <escaped> tokens are imported from [RFC 2396]. [RFC 2396] <urn:ietf:rfc:2396>. [RFC 2141] Moats, R. "URN Syntax", RFC 2141, <urn:ietf:rfc:2141>, May 1997. [RFC 2611] <urn:ietf:rfc:2611>. [RFC 2434] <urn:ietf:rfc:2434>. Identifier uniqueness considerations: The delegated authorities must ensure that conforming URNs following these rules are unique; assigned to at most one resource, and not reassigned under any circumstances. Identifier persistence considerations: URNs have the requirement that they be persistently bound to one resource. Process of identifier assignment: Assignment of URNs using this scheme is completely open, provided the following algorithm is adhered to. Assignment is based upon ownership of a domain name for a particular month. Upon ownership of a certain approved domain name for a calendar month, the owner of the domain name acquires the right to create names under the corresponding authority part. For example, if Fred Bloggs owns the domain example.org for the entire month of May, in the year 2002, then he acquires the right to create names under the authority component (<authority>):- example.org,2002-05 This is a non-transferable right. Persons or entities MUST NOT create URNs using authority components (<authority>) that they do not own based upon the rules above. Practically speaking, one will be using the date of the last month that one held the domain, and not the current month (which one is not guaranteed to hold, even if this is a likely eventuality). Process for identifier resolution: It is possible (but not required) that the identifiers may be resolved by converting the authority and name components into a request using the HTTP protocol. In such a method, all commas (,), hyphens (-), and colons (:) are replaced with slashes (/). The colon (:) separating the authority and the name is also replaced with a slash. For example:- urn:pts:example.org,2002-05:foo:bar would become:- http://example.org/2002/05/foo/bar Obviously such a mechanism of resolution would not be persistent. Rules for Lexical Equivalence: Two PTS URNs are equivalent if the strings are character-for-character equivalent. Conformance with URN Syntax: No special considerations. Processors of these URNs must follow the conventions in [RFC 2141], notably Section 5, "Lexical Equivalence in URNs". Validation mechanism: None specified. Scope: Global. These URNs may be referred to by anyone worldwide, for use in their own applications. We encourage the use of these URNs. Palmer and Swartz Informational [Page 2]
Received on Thursday, 2 August 2001 23:05:02 UTC