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From: PETERSEN@ctrvx1.vanderbilt.edu (Ghost in the -Turing- Machine)
Newsgroups: comp.protocols.iso.x400
Subject: Re: Printable format (was: Re: ISO/CCITT meeting report)
Message-ID: <9008170718.aa15874@ICS.UCI.EDU>
Date: 17 Aug 90 15:08:02 GMT
Lines: 38
Approved: usenet@ICS.UCI.EDU
X-VMS-To: IN%"mhsnews@ICS.UCI.EDU"

> From:	IN%"mr@ritd.co.UK" 17-AUG-1990 04:40:24.15
> Subject: Re: Printable format (was: Re: ISO/CCITT meeting report)
> Message-Id: <1186.9008170736@coyote.ritd.co.uk>
>
> Yet I (as an end user) don't need to know all that (or care). To most
> users around here it is a short, *typographically simple* string that is
> relatively easy to use and communicate to others. It's the job of our
> and other mail handlers to parse such an address "sensibly". Isn't that
> why we write software?
>
>         Martin Reed, Racal Imaging Systems Ltd

    I suppose I will add my $0.02 also.  I think that this is the best
comment I have seen so far on this subject.  We write software to do things
that we don't want to do or cannot do, or at least that's my justification.
I don't want to HAVE to remember all of the necessary attributes for anybody's
e-Mail address, and I don't want to have to type it all in correctly every
time I want to send to someone.  Therefore, I like the current name-server
system in the Internet model.  Why should my host or any host outside of the
domain itself know how to reach a specific host or person in another domain,
and why should a user have to know a complete routing specification?

    As far as I am concerned, the answer is obvious.  Only the "owners"
should NEED to have complete knowledge of their domain.  Others should be
able to specify a certain mailbox within the domain quickly and easily and
have the software route everything from there...  This, of course, may be
a completely unrealistic approach in the global network of tomorrow...

-Chris

                             +------------------+
                              \ Chris Petersen /
       +-----------------------+--------------+----------------------+
      /  Vanderbilt University Computer Center - Systems Development  \
     / petersen@ctrvax.Vanderbilt.EDU  .AND.  petersen@VUctrvx1.Bitnet \
    +-------------------------------------------------------------------+
               { "You're quoting me?  I make it up as I go!" }
               +---------------------------------------------+