Subject: [Fwd: RFC 2916 on E.164 number and DNS]

From: "Eric A. Hall" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 28 Sep 2000 09:43:45 -0700

Although I confess to being out of the loop on many things, I have a
couple of issues with this particular RR.

As I have stated many times, DNS is a lousy directory, partly due to an
inability to provide different answer sets in response to different query
sources. There is no way to provide one set of RRs to anonymous users
versus detailed answers to specific users versus other detailed answers to
other users. It would seem that that this particular extension would
pretty much require such a mechanism in order to be fully realized, and as
such, DNS is the wrong database for this extension.

"2. E.164 numbers and DNS

   "The domain "e164.arpa" is being populated in order to provide the
    infrastructure in DNS for storage of E.164 numbers."

Shouldn't that be the e164.int tree?

Considering the number of similar RRs that have been shot down by this
group, I am surprised that this one went through. Was this group included
in the development of this RR? The announcement didn't go here.

-- 
Eric A. Hall                                        http://www.ehsco.com/
Internet Core Protocols          http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/coreprot/

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From: Randy Bush <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 28 Sep 2000 11:44:21 -0700

> Shouldn't that be the e164.int tree?

see <http://www.iab.org/iab/statement-on-infrastructure-domains.txt>

> group, I am surprised that this one went through.

it's not an rr

randy

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From: "Eric A. Hall" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 28 Sep 2000 14:37:37 -0700

[ as this is not a protocol issue, the discussion will please move to
  dnsop or poisson.  this is the last message i will approve on the topic
  -- randy ]

Good thing I made a disclaimer

Olafur Gudmundsson wrote:
> "Eric A. Hall" writes
> Due to ownership issues of ".int" domain, all registrations that need
> persistent name are now registered in the .arpa domain.
> IPv6 reverse map just migrated from .int to .arpa, in RFC2874
> like this into the IESG controlled .arpa domain.

I suppose there will be an RFC on this that updates the definitions made
in RFC 1591? Just curious.

>  > Considering the number of similar RRs that have been shot down by
>  > this group, I am surprised that this one went through. Was this
>  > group included in the development of this RR? The announcement
>  > didn't go here.
> 
> Not a new RR, just new use of an existing RR, thus no changes to
> servers or resolvers only applications that want to use this.

Okay, that's the correct way to state it. I don't know why I wrote what I
did when it's obviously not a new RR, but instead is an arbitrary addition
to the namespace for the sole purpose of adding an arbitrary index for
non-existent objects.

I suppose my concern is: the namespace has historically provided an index
for RRs sorted by domain name, except for a couple of cases where the RRs
needed to be sorted by value (A records). My understanding is that there
has been resistance to adding new indexes based on other RRs (a namespace
hierarchy for MX RRs that listed mail servers with the mail domains that
they serve could be useful) and there has been resistance to RRs that
provide directory-like functionality, since both of those extensions would
take DNS beyond the boundaries of a naming service.

In that light, the addition of an index of objects that don't exist as
resources on the Internet in any form seems somewhat surprising. This is
particularly true given that the long-term benefits of the index would be
to provide authenticated answers (anonymous data, data for my boss, data
for my family). Isn't this exactly the purpose of a directory, and the
exact antithesis of a limited-scope naming service like DNS?

I have no position on it one way or the other. I find it confusing that
one group will play whack-a-mole on any extension effort while others will
gladly extend DNS however they see fit.

This will probably get political fast so I will stop. Just interesting.

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From: Olafur Gudmundsson <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 28 Sep 2000 16:25:47 -0400

"Eric A. Hall" writes

 > in the development of this RR? The announcement didn't go here.

Not a new RR, just new use of an existing RR, thus no changes to servers
or resolvers only applications that want to use this.

	Olafur