I suggest that the IETF position should be that if INTERNET addresses
are to be used in X.400 along the lines of this new proposal, that the
INTERNET addresses must be used as they are in the internet, and that
routing on them should be done the way routing is done on them on the
Internet.
It should be prohibited to append the ADMD or PRMD or COUNTRY name, as
proposed.
That is, there must be no direct routing information in the Right Hand
Side of the @sign, as would be the case with the C=, A=, or P=
atributes somehow added to the right hand side.
Clearly this is being proposed for routing purposes, which would give
INTERNET addresses the same bad features of X.400, without improving
things at all. C=, A=, and P= attributes were included in X.400 84
for routing purposes, as I understand it, because they had no idea
then for how to route X.400 mail without putting routing information
in the addresses.
We are still trying to deal with a part of the world that thinks of
the name/address tree as a routing table, such that mail has to flow
up to the ADMDs to move between PRMDs.
The IETF should oppose any such scheme. We should propose an
alternative which is to simply allow regular INTERNET addresses, as
they are used in the INTERNET, precisely for the reason that then they
will not require translation in gateways.
Adding INTERNET address (as is) to the allowed X.400 ORAddress space
would be a really useful thing to do, by eliminating gateway
translations. Also, then the same mapping rules now used for current
X.400 to INTERNET address translations could be used for old/new X.400
mappings;-).
BTW, where did this proposal originate? Is this something that came
out of an EMA sponsored effort to find a way to improve X.400
addresses? Or is the EMA not involved?
I wonder why this proposal did not receive wider exposure in the US
before going forward? It only seems like it would be a proper
courtesy to seek comment from the INTERNET community.
I wonder if this how teh IETF is expected to LIASE with ISO/ITU-T? --
By lobbing such missives to each other over the walls of the
international standards bodies? To me, this mode of liaison only
looks like a generous waste of time and effort.
Best...\Stef