On Mon, 19 Mar 2001, Scott Francis wrote:
We routinely use directory services in a multiplicity of forms -- telephone books published by local telephone companies or entrepreneurs, 411 services in various shapes and forms, web pages, or even on CD-ROMs (indeed a well known Supreme Court case involved a telephone directory published on CD-ROM).
yes, and multiple directory services are a great thing. However, when I dial +1.310.642.0351 it reaches the same number no matter where the call originates, in what phone network, who my LD carrier is, who my local telco is, or how many switches it passes through on the way.
But if you access, for example, www.bbc.co.uk there is no knowing which of many machines you will reach, nor even what continent that machine is on.
Multiple equally valid 'root zones' will most certainly give rise to a situation analogous to calling a phone number and having it ring at different destinations depending on the point of origin.
Yes. But we are already there and have been for a long time. Because of the widespread use of NAT, proxy servers, round robin DNS, local directors, and other such technology, a very large fraction of IP traffic is already thoroughly "virtualized". Where transparent proxy servers are involved, party A trying to access party B is actually talking to machines owned by party C, which may be getting the information from party D, with A, B, C, and D all being legally distinct entities. The network operators keep all of this running smoothly, although there are at least tens of thousands of such schemes (NAT, [transparent] proxying, etc) in operation. Distibuting the root of the DNS would be far less complex - and far less vulnerable to spoofing and other such technical trickery. I am not saying that it would be invulnerable, just less open than the kaleidescope of trickery already in operation. -- Jim Dixon VBCnet GB Ltd http://www.vbc.net tel +44 117 929 1316 fax +44 117 927 2015