taylor@glasgow.glasgow.UUCP (Jem Taylor) (09/12/86)
The following is a message posted to the mailgroup DL in the UK ... the problem of ambiguity between least and most significant name components is of interest to all those who have to cope with both BigEndFirst and SmallEndFirst; Have Internet and Arpanet people considered this problem when naming their hosts ? -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- In view of the recent debate [ on a DL in the UK, and not on this board ] about the wisdom (or otherwise) of naming a system as uk.......com , which introduces Little/Big-Endian ambiguity, I have collected together the names of all the top-level domains of which I am aware. Since it is desirable to avoid using any of the names in the list below as the final [ that is, in UK order, the LEAST SIGNIFICANT ] component (or indeed any component) of a name, I am circulating this list and would like to hear of any additions. I would like to suggest that a new constraint be placed on the NRS [ the Name Registration Scheme - the UK master nameserver database ], to the effect that top-level names may not be used as lower-level (especially final) components of new registrations. The reasons for this constraint are two-fold: (1) Not permitting a top-level domain name to occur as the final sub-domain name eliminates Little/Big Ambiguity. (2) Not permitting a top-level domain name to occur as an intermediate sub- domain name allows users to input partially resolved domain names of the form mysite.mydept instead of the fully-qualified domain name top.sub.sub1.mysit.mydept without thereby introducing Little/Big Ambiguity. Examples of the Ambiguity: (1) uk......com - or is that com.....uk ? (2) uk.ac.edu.vax - typed as edu.vax from uk.ac.edu.prime - is that vax.edu ? Although many sites stick firmly to one ordering or the other (JANET or ARPA), some sites will always have to try to understand both orders, in order to relay between incompatible domains or to allow users to type the addresses which their correspondants have told them in the other order. -Jem Taylor. ________________________________________________________________________________ JANET: taylor@uk.ac.glasgow.cs UseNet: mcvax!ukc!cs.glasgow.ac.uk!taylor ARPANet: taylor%cs.glasgow.ac.uk@{ucl-cs.arpa,cs.ucl.ac.uk} Phone: +44 (0)41 339-8855 extn. 6054 Mail: J.A.Taylor, Computer Science, 17 Lilybank Gardens, GB-GLASGOW G12 8QQ ________________________________________________________________________________ List of top domains (and relays): EAN domains reachable from UCL. uk - United Kingdom au - University of Melbourne, Australia cdn - CDNnet, Canada cern - European Organization for Nuclear Research, Geneva chunet - Swiss University Network, Switzerland dfn - Deutsche Forshungsnetz, West Germany hasler - Telecommunications Equipment Manufacturer, Switzerland iris - Spain irl - Ireland osiride - Italy sunet - Swedish University Network, Sweden surfnet - Netherlands uninett - Norwegian University Network, Norway [From UCL.CS:<DOC>ean.sites, July 25, 1986] Unix system well-known domains (from Sendmail/UK-1.4/chn/Examples.a) Domain Relay ------ ----- uucp ukc.ac.uk oz ukc.ac.uk csnet relay.cs.net (A.K.A csnet-relay.arpa, csnet-relay) bitnet wiscvm.wisc.edu mailnet multics.mit.edu dec decwrl.dec.com NRS top level domains (from NRS:t.central): CERN UK DESY Domain Gateway Context(s) ARPA UK.AC.UCL.CS MAIL-NIFTP MIL UK.AC.UCL.CS MAIL-NIFTP GOV UK.AC.UCL.CS MAIL-NIFTP EDU UK.AC.UCL.CS MAIL-NIFTP COM UK.AC.UCL.CS MAIL-NIFTP ORG UK.AC.UCL.CS MAIL-NIFTP US UK.AC.UCL.CS MAIL-NIFTP EARN UK.AC.RUTHERFORD.EARN MAIL-NIFTP -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -- ________________________________________________________________________________ JANET: taylor@uk.ac.glasgow.cs UseNet: mcvax!ukc!cs.glasgow.ac.uk!taylor ARPANet: taylor%cs.glasgow.ac.uk@{ucl-cs.arpa,cs.ucl.ac.uk} Phone: +44 (0)41 339-8855 extn. 6054 Mail: J.A.Taylor, Computer Science, 17 Lilybank Gardens, GB-GLASGOW G12 8QQ ________________________________________________________________________________