Checking the path to my DNS servers tells you NOTHING about the path to my hosts.

Right. But your situation is not the one being looked at, as you don't have geograpically distributed web servers. I believe for that situation 3DNS, et. al., can work. Once the client's DNS request has worked its way over to the primary DNS for the distributed web-servers, 3DNS has each of the other 3DNS boxes (located adjacent to the other distributed servers) ping the *clients* primary DNS. 3DNS then returns the URL for the web-server whose 3DNS machine is 'closest' (fewest hops) to the clients DNS machine. Thus, for example, clients in Asia can get to a server in Asia. I think that's the gist of it, if not the specifics... Joe Joe Loiacono Phone: (301) 794-2509 Computer Sciences Corporation Fax: (301) 794-9480