🚀 go-pugleaf

There are, basically, two groups of top-level domains. The first are pretty
obsolete, and are simply the name of the network that machine is on. The site
I'm posting this from, killer.UUCP, is on USENET exclusively. Similarly,
foo.ARPA denotes an ARPA Internet site, and foo.BITNET means that the machine
is on bitnet.

Domains now are more descriptive. The "real" type of domain is something like
sgistl.SGI.COM -- the machine is sgistl, it is at SGI, and SGI is a COMpany.
Other top-level domains are .EDU for Universities (EDUcational institution)
and .ORG for organizations. Foreign sites use the country abbreviation for
the top-level domain, i.e. .UK for the United Kingdom. The big advantage
with this type of site domain name is that it is the same regardless of how
many networks a machine is on; a message sent to aramis.rutgers.edu is likely
to arrive whether send from a UUCP-only site with smail or an Internet-only
site with sendmail.
-- 
Bill Wisner, HASA 'A' Division		..ihnp4!killer!billw
"It's the coarse feel of the rope that I don't like."

In article <5533@sgistl.SGI.COM> larry@sgistl.SGI.COM (Larry Autry) writes:
>I have noticed different suffixes in the mail addresses on the net. Some are
>.COM, and others are .UUCP.  What are the different suffixes and domain types?
>I have seen other suffixes besides the two mentioned.

The current list of top level domains is (at the moment):

  .COM  -  Commercial organizations
  .EDU  -  Educational institutions
  .GOV  -  Government organizations
  .MIL  -  Military sites
  .NET  -  Network administration sites
  .ORG  -  Other random "organizations" that don't fit in any other domain

plus, the ISO country codes (like .UK, .AU, etc.) are top-level domains
for the associated countries.

The .ARPA domain is a temporary top-level domain for old ARPANET/MILNET
sites who haven't converted to the domain system yet.  There is no such
thing as the .UUCP domain (at least, as far as the root nameservers are
concerned);  it is a "fake" domain that some mailers happen to know how
to deal with.

--Pat.

In article <1885@killer.UUCP> billw@killer.UUCP (Bill Wisner) writes:
> Foreign sites use the country abbreviation for the top-level domain,
> i.e. .UK for the United Kingdom.

Quite correct, given that you are looking at the address from the "domain
system" point of view (which, I'm sure you are).  However, all the world
is not the same!  If you step into the United Kingdom their top level
becomes "UK.".  The NRS decided to use names like "UK.AC.Ucl.Cs" (note the
reverse order).  While this makes for more work in gateways between the
two systems, the result is *almost* always transparent to the end user
(i.e. under our "domain system", you would still use "Cs.Ucl.AC.UK").

Just adding a little dirt to the clear water...  :-)
---
Jeff Forys @ UC/Boulder Engineering Research Comp Cntr (303-492-4991)
forys@boulder.Colorado.EDU  -or-  ..!{hao|nbires}!boulder!forys

Me:
>> Foreign sites use the country abbreviation for the top-level domain,
>> i.e. .UK for the United Kingdom.

Jeff Forys:
>Quite correct, given that you are looking at the address from the "domain
>system" point of view (which, I'm sure you are).  However, all the world
>is not the same!  If you step into the United Kingdom their top level
>becomes "UK.".  The NRS decided to use names like "UK.AC.Ucl.Cs" (note the
>reverse order).

But then, the original question came from someone within the US.

One way of looking at it might be that those screwy Brits decided to futz
things up again :-), and change the definition of "top level".. to them,
perhaps the top level logically comes first, while to us yanks top leve
should be at the end. Or, maybe these are just the crazed midnight ramblings
of someone who really doesn't know what he's talking about.

Yes, that seems likely.
-- 
Bill Wisner, HASA "A" Division		..{codas,ihnp4}!killer!billw
"It's the coarse feel of the rope that I don't like."

forys@boulder.Colorado.EDU (Jeff Forys) writes:
>The NRS decided to use names like "UK.AC.Ucl.Cs" (note the reverse order).

When I first discovered the UK reversal, I was a bit confused.  Now, I am used
to it, like driving on the other side of the road.  But why is it done this
way?

Also, I have been getting to %uk...% by the CSnet relay.  We are getting a
uunet account.  How will that change the way I get to UK sites?
-- 
randy%oresoft.uucp@tektronix.tek.com                     FidoNet:1/105/6
randy%oresoft.uucp%tektronix.tek.com@relay.cs.net        1+(503) 245-2202

Another confusing question --

I received a mail from user%opus@mucocs.cs.mcgill.ca
Now I can't get to send a successful reply to the 
person. Any advice/wisdom will be appreciated. Thanks
in advance

Dipto Chakravarty	     dipto@umbc3.umd.edu.ARPA
Univ. of Maryland	     dipto@umbc2.umd.edu.BITNET

I just thought I should point out that the NIC is currently
restricting .gov to be only federal government.  I suggested that they
extend the .gov to include state and local government since they have
no where else to logically register but was turned down.  It can also
be noted that the NIC discourages the use of .org.

Cheers,
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Computer Science Department			         Mark A. Verber
The Ohio State University			 verber@ohio-state.arpa
+1 (614) 292-7344				  cbosgd!osu-cis!verber

>the top-level domain, i.e. .UK for the United Kingdom. The big advantage
>with this type of site domain name is that it is the same regardless of how
>many networks a machine is on; a message sent to aramis.rutgers.edu is likely
>to arrive whether send from a UUCP-only site with smail or an Internet-only
>site with sendmail.

I like to believe that. It is really nice to see it actually works on all
nets interconnected to each other. But the big problem is that many gateways,
network routing tables/databases still do not recognize this kind of address-
ing. That means you have to route explicitly through some gateway.

Hassan Rajaei
rajaei@ttds.tds.kth.se

In article <86@oresoft.UUCP> randy@oresoft.UUCP (Randy Bush) writes:
> When I first discovered the UK reversal, I was a bit confused.  But why
> is it done this way?

I had heard that the NRS decision to use reverse ordering (*) was made
independent of the "domain system" draft.  Rumor has it that the NRS
originally planned to use underscores, where we spec'd dots!  They were
later persuaded to change the underscore, but wouldnt budge on the order.

> Also, I have been getting to %uk...% by the CSnet relay.  We are getting
> a uunet account.  How will that change the way I get to UK sites?

I cant see that it will make a difference (provided your mailer knows
what's going on).  You should send mail to your "postmaster" to be sure.
Again, the gateways handle the reversal, so you need not worry about it.

(*) Of course, "reverse order" depends on which side you look at it.  :-)
---
Jeff Forys @ UC/Boulder Engineering Research Comp Cntr (303-492-4991)
forys@boulder.Colorado.EDU  -or-  ..!{hao|nbires}!boulder!forys

Summary:
Expires:
Sender:
Followup-To:

If you want to reach the uk from uucp you go through ukc. We will gateway it
onto JANET (the uk network for you. What is more you don't even need to worry
about our *stupid* domain ordering problem, we sort that out as we. So to mail
a uk site either

	..!ukc!site.ac.uk!user
or
	user%site.ac.uk@ukc

will work. If not mail postmaster@ukc and I will try and sort it out.

	sean

In article <1907@killer.UUCP> billw@killer.UUCP (Bill Wisner) writes:
>One way of looking at it might be that those screwy Brits decided to futz
>things up again :-), and change the definition of "top level".. to them,
>perhaps the top level logically comes first, while to us yanks top leve
>should be at the end. Or, maybe these are just the crazed midnight ramblings
>of someone who really doesn't know what he's talking about.


well, if you think about it ...

their scheme is more usable.  For instance ... a list of domain names
will sort into the proper order ...  

Of course, if this discussion goes on too long I'll post that
RFC entitled --- On Holy Wars, or A Plea for Peace.
-- 
<---- David Herron,  Local E-Mail Hack,  david@ms.uky.edu, david@ms.uky.csnet
<----                    {rutgers,uunet,cbosgd}!ukma!david, david@UKMA.BITNET
<---- I thought that time was this neat invention that kept everything
<---- from happening at once.  Why doesn't this work in practice?

David Herron responds to an earlier article from yours truly:

>well, if you think about it ...

>their scheme is more usable.  For instance ... a list of domain names
>will sort into the proper order ...  

I always viewed it as being rather similar to which side of the road you
drive on. And your statement depends highly on what you consider the proper
order.. but enough of that.

>Of course, if this discussion goes on too long I'll post that
>RFC entitled --- On Holy Wars, or A Plea for Peace.

Mail that one to Mark Ethan Smith.
-- 
Bill Wisner				..{codas,ihnp4}!ddsw1!igloo!billw
"I don't mind at all.." -- Bourgeois Tagg