# Re: Internet Draft on URNs

John Curran (jcurran@nic.near.net)
Tue, 18 May 1993 12:42:50 -0400

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    Message-Id: <9305181644.AA02035@mocha.bunyip.com>

    To: Terry Winograd <winograd@interval.com>

    Subject: Re: Internet Draft on URNs

    In-Reply-To: Your message of Mon, 17 May 1993 23:37:28 -0800.

                 <9305180637.AA19640@interval.interval.com>

    Date: Tue, 18 May 1993 12:42:50 -0400

    From: John Curran <jcurran@nic.near.net>

--------
] From: Terry Winograd <winograd@interval.com>
] Subject: Re: Internet Draft on URNs
] Date: Mon, 17 May 1993 23:37:28 -0800
]
] It isn't clear to me why this is a two level system instead of a more
] generic hierarchical system as in domain names. The proposed version
] implies that there is one worldwide global name authority that is supposed
] to guarantee the uniqueness of all scheme names and for any scheme there
] must be a single organization that deals with all individual authorities.
] If you assume that there will only be a few schemes and authorities this
] would be possible (though it has a potential bottleneck). But in the
] widely distributed world, URNs will be used at all levels. For example the
] report series for my local department will provide URNs with the department
] as the naming authority and the report sequence number as the opaque
] string. In a world with appropriate privacy protections, each person will
] be assigned a unique URN by every distinct organization and agency they
] deal with, etc.

Nothing in the URN prevents the use of a "generic hierarchical system"
of names. Place your heirarchical identifier in the authority field:

ISOC:subgroup.interval.com::whatever-you-want:::

The URN format is sufficiently flexible to accomodate many hierarchical
systems; the scheme registration is required to span multiple naming
spaces (such as X.500 RNs, DNS names, MD5 checksums, or E.164 addresses)

/John

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