The attached exchange between anish(_at_)ctt(_dot_)bellcore(_dot_)com and
Jueneman(_at_)gte(_dot_)com is focused on the handling of nicknames. However,
the underlying assumption is that email addresses are the basic form
of identity used in the Internet.
On the Internet, yes. And I think it sucks. My university spends
countless consulting and course hours trying to explain to bright students
how the addresses work and why. As opposed to adapting the technology to
how people work in the real world, we have adapted the people to the
technology and software we could implement at the time (over a decade). Do
you really think the whole world is going to adapt? Why should we continue
to force them to?
In all other interactions of my life, I do not use an email address to
identify myself.
In my view, the introduction of X.500 distinguished names has been a
very troublesome venture, and I see no evidence that things will get
better. Quite a lot has to happen before X.500 names are genuinely
useful as the basis for identity on the net.
I disagree. Observe the following DN in User Friendly Notation and
corresponding email addresses:
William C Green, vs.
green(_at_)wowbagger(_dot_)cc(_dot_)utexas(_dot_)edu
Computation Center, or
University of Texas at Austin,
w(_dot_)green(_at_)utexas(_dot_)edu
Texas,
US
One of these can be recognized and understood by people throughout the
world (looks kind of like what we have seen on correspondence for the past
century). The other can only be recognized by about 20,000,000 people in
the world and understood by even less. And the email addresses I use are
pretty friendly compared to a lot that I've seen. The DN uniquely
identifies me at the University of Texas. The email addresses narrow the
field to three in the case of w.green, and 77 in the case of just green
(the Comp Center - cc - provides mail to the whole campus). The DN
provides organizational information -- the email address doesn't.
Even if email addresses were used, there would still have to be
certification hierarchies. The infrastructure for X.500 is all described
and being implemented for use in multiple applications -- not just PEM (our
plans are to use certificates for everything from unlocking dorms to buying
cokes). I believe you would run into the same problems and trade-offs in
implementing such an infrastructure with email addresses that have occurred
in the X.500 model -- only the solution would be single purpose. .
X.500 is complex, burdensome, and inflexible (I use more colorful
adjectives when my door is closed). Believe you me, I know-- I run an
80,000 entry DSA. But I would take a DN over an email address for business
correspondence any day of the week.
-William