NIC handle writeup

Havard,

On Fri, Sep 25, 1998 at 01:03:47AM +0200, Havard.Eidnes at runit.sintef.no wrote:
>
> > 	I think that there will be problems with "@" as the
> > 	seperator.  It's too much like a viable email address. I
> > 	applaude the use of the domain name on the right and a
> > 	domain specific unique handle on the left, the concern is
> > 	the seperator. Howabout something like "%"?
> 
> I fully agree.  Another option could be ":".

I think ':' would be a fine choice.

> Then there is the
> already established practice of using "-" (as in RIPE's case), I
> don't see what's so terribly wrong with that.  Making NIC handles
> into something which could be mistaken for an e-mail address just
> leads to confusion.

I also like '-' best but there are some non trivial problems with
handles like xxx-ORG and some other organizations that use '-' in the
suffix part.

> (No, I don't think it's such a great idea to
> provide automatic mail forwarding service by the registry.)

Agreed.

> 
> I also don't think it's such a great idea to use domain names to
> identify the origin of the data; I think a separate name space
> should be used instead, e.g. one which could provide more
> permancence.  (As Bill mentioned, what do you do when a registry
> closes down and its corresponding domain name is subsequently
> removed?)

This draft is an attempt to bring some structure in an unstructured
name space. The problem occured in the first place because of a lack
of cooperation. I don't see any reason why that would change if we
write a nice draft and propose that somebody (who?) needs to maintain
a separate namespace. I think that the only option that we have is to
create something that requires *no* coordination whatsoever and that
allows registries to use nearly all characters that they want to use.

David K.
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