[db-wg] NCC still enforcing descr: content

Hi Job and others

First of all in all operational objects (INETNUM, INET6NUM, AUT-NUM, 
ROUTE) the "descr:" attribute is multiple. It was the value of the 
'first' "descr:" attribute that was constrained to represent the 
organisation legal name. This was a crazy work around at the time. 
Trying to constrain a free text value to be fixed as a copy of another 
free text element. The reason this was dreamt up is because of the lack 
of inheritance in the data model. Also at the time the lack of 
confidence in positioning the ORGANISATION object at the centre of any 
database user's set of data and enforcing a reference to it.


On 03/08/2015 23:50, Job Snijders wrote:
> On Mon, Aug 03, 2015 at 11:18:09PM +0200, Sander Steffann wrote:
>>> option B seems like a cleaner long term fix.
>>
>> I agree. I think leaving descr: mandatory will lead to confusion.
>
> I disagree, the only confusion so far as been that that attribute's
> value cannot be a description but in the past had to be the 'proper'
> company name.

This is not quite right. Only the first description line had to be the 
company name. Other descriptions could have been added and in many cases 
probably have been.

>
>> Some descr: will refer to an organisation, some will not, some will
>> refer to a different organisation than org:, and for new objects some
>> content for descr: will have to be invented not because there is any
>> useful information but just because the field is mandatory...
>>
>> If we clean this up I think we should do it properly.
>
> To me the "descr:" attribute is an easy to parse component of an IRR
> object, there is only one "descr:" line, and it is mandatory according
> to RFC.

Not according to the RIPE Database implementation. It is a multiple 
attribute in all operational objects. When you say "easy to parse" I 
presume you mean by a human reading the data. Free text is never easy to 
parse by software.


>
> If I look at organisations that have multiple ASNs the "descr:"
> attribute can be an informative hint which department or thingy you are
> dealing with. Semantically "descr:" is an easy place to look for a short
> summary of what the object is about.
>
> A parser can follow the "org:" object for a degree of legal validity,
> and use "descr:" for an informal, informative textual representation of
> what the object might be.

Many objects probably already have these descriptions. So if you make it 
optional and remove the first "descr:" attribute, which is the one that 
was enforced to be a copy of the org name, then you have what you are 
asking for.

cheers
denis


>
> Kind regards,
>
> Job
>