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From: scott@wiley.uucp (Scott Simpson)
Newsgroups: comp.mail.uucp
Subject: Re: Convincing Smail to use FQDNs
Message-ID: <26D46498.3570@wilbur.coyote.trw.com>
Date: 23 Aug 90 23:19:52 GMT
References: <5IA5TY9@ggpc2.ferranti.com> <3890@ralph.Lafayette.LA.US> <UZC5=UA@xds13.ferranti.com> <3932@ralph.Lafayette.LA.US>
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Reply-To: scott@wiley.UUCP (Scott Simpson)
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In article <3932@ralph.Lafayette.LA.US> pja@ralph.Lafayette.LA.US (Pete Alleman) writes:
>It would help if there were (or I knew) the standard terminology.
>I once heard that "The Internet" was the collection of hosts with
>registered A records, whereas the "internet" was "The Internet"
>plus all those sites with registered MX records.

I was under the impression that the Internet was composed of those
hosts that spoke IP and could talk IP to everybody else on the
Internet.  This would rule out MX/uucp sites. Of course you can
address MX/uucp sites, but name addressing and IP packet routing are
two orthogonal issues.  Remember the goals of the Internet:

	1. Universal connectivity.
	2. Hiding underlying technology.
	3. Not mandating a specific network topology.

(There may be more.) The word "internet" I think of as a general term
for interconnected networks (e.g., separate ethernets) and not a
reference to a specific internet in particular.
Scott Simpson    		TRW 			scott@coyote.trw.com