[Random-bits] Network Solutions' Common Name Resolution Protocol

[James Love]

Network Solutions' Common Name Resolution Protocol

The text below is from:

http://cnrp.research.netsol.com/

So just what is CNRP?
       
      The Common Name Resolution Protocol allows you to send queries and
receive results for a specific set of things that we call Common Names.
Common Names (CNs) are names that are engineered to behave the way human
beings use names. 
       
      For example, people are perfectly comfortable with two different
things being called the same thing. When we say something about "Joe
Smith" we don't worry about the fact that there are probably several
thousand Joe Smiths in the world. We know that we're probably limiting
the scope of our discussion to some known understood geographic area or
circle of friends. 
       
      On the Internet the names that have been used to date are all
engineered to make life easy for the machines. We as humans don't need
dots, dashes, squiggles and colons to be able to get by. So why should
we have to conform to the machines? Why can't we get them to handle
names for things the way we do normally? 
       
      That's where common-names come into play. CNs have three
attributes that ordinary Internet names such as email addresses and URLs
don't have: non-uniqueness, parameterization and an unlimited character
set. Those big words just mean that 

        1.Non-uniqueness -- two objects can have the same name.
          
         This means that very often when you use a common-name you will
be asked which one out of a list is the one you are really looking for.
          
        2.Parameterization -- a common-name query can include other
information such as the location, topic or language you happen to be
interested in.
          
         This means that you can contain a given common-name to the
geographic region that it applies to. For example, there may be two
"Joe's Pizza". One is in Atlanta and the other is in New York. CNRP
allows you to specify the area in which you live so that when you look
up "Joe's Pizza" you don't get the one on the other side of the planet.
          
        3.Unlimited character set -- A common name can include any
character in any language.
          
         In your common name you can include spaces, puncuation spaces,
exclamation marks, chinese language characters, etc. The options are
unlimited and allow you to best symbolize your name. 
          


       
      Examples
       
      Here are some examples. If you have our Internet Explorer plugin
installed then click below to see to it in action:
       

         go:Microsoft 
         go:Network Solutions 
         go:Michael Mealling 

-- 
James Love, Consumer Project on Technology
v. 1.202.387.8030, fax 1.202.234.5176
love@cptech.org, http://www.cptech.org