Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!ANDREW.CMU.EDU!cfe+ From: cfe+@ANDREW.CMU.EDU ("Craig F. Everhart") Newsgroups: comp.protocols.tcp-ip Subject: Re: Seeking advice on establishing a LARGE centralized mail system Message-ID: Date: 2 May 89 20:17:38 GMT References: <8905011728.AA11398@TOTO.MIT.EDU> Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Organization: The Internet Lines: 31 The CMU installation of the Andrew system, andrew.cmu.edu, supports a name space of 8500 users. For an installation of this size, I believe it to be difficult or impossible to make somebody's unique ID correspond in a predictable way to their full legal name. (Some smaller installations, such as CMU's Computer Science department (cs.cmu.edu) with maybe 3000 users, feel that they can make the unique ID be the preferable Firstname.I.Lastname, so Andrew also supports that canonical format for such installations.) We tackled the problems of mapping name probes to the space of all names in a distributed manner, and came up with Andrew's White Pages, a name lookup service that can match probes using abbreviations, phonetic heuristics, and the like. The service runs via AFS on any workstation, not simply on a mail hub. We use it for mail delivery, as well, with results such as: - mail delivery to the named user - error response generated if the name probe was unique but only a fuzzy match - error response generated if the name probe was ambiguous; possible matches listed if there aren't more than a given number of them - error response generated if no match could be found. This has been in place for two years or more. In progress is a mechanism whereby people can update aspects of their own White Pages entries automatically, with optional administrative approval. Integrating larger lists of names, with optional mail deliveries such as paper campus-mail delivery, is a cute idea. We haven't pursued it very hard, but we think it could be fun. Craig Everhart Andrew message system