CURRENT_MEETING_REPORT_

Reported by Joan Gargano/University of California, Davis

Minutes of the WHOIS and Network Information Lookup Service Working
Group (WNILS)


Status of the WHOIS++ Internet-Drafts

Two of the documents are ready for submission as RFCs with the
recommendation of Proposed Standard status, ``Recommended Modifications
to the WHOIS Protocol'' by Joan Gargano and Ken Weiss, and ``The
Distributed WHOIS++ Model - Centroids'' by Chris Weider and Simon Spero.

The WHOIS++ Architecture paper by Peter Deutsch has been updated by
Rickard Schoultz and Patrik Faltstrom.  This paper will be submitted to the
mailing list for review.  Upon approval, this paper will be submitted as
an RFC and recommended as a Proposed Standard.


Overview of the WHOIS++ Architecture Document

Rickard Schoultz and Patrik Faltstrom provided an overview of the revisions
they made to the WHOIS++ Architecture document based on implementation
experience.  They reported that they have five WHOIS++ servers with
centroids running in Sweden.

Summary of proposed changes to the WHOIS++ Architecture document:


   o Server now only sends either FULL or SUMMARY as default.  ABRIDGED
     is only sent on clients' explicit demand.

   o Introduced MAXFULL constraint for limiting the number of matches
     when a server sends a SUMMARY.

   o ABRIDGED is no longer required to include the attribute value that
     caused the match.

   o Support was added for MIME response format.

   o POINTER replaced with SERVERS-TO-ASK.

   o New BNF.

   o POLLED-BY and POLLED-FOR is required.

   o Removed search specifier ATTRIBUTE. No more ATTRIBUTE=x;VALUE=y.

   o VALUE search specifier now made default (as opposed to SEARCH-ALL).

   o Section on optional commands removed.  We need those commands, but
     we have to put more work into them.  Moved that to a companion
     paper.

   o Only kept the PASSWORD authentication method.

   o Banner messages now required from server.

   o Timeout constraint not changeable by client.

   o Removed all short-form of search term specifiers except `!'
     (handle).

   o Described numeric response messages.

   o All search responses must include starting and ending system
     message.  Search response is made optional.

   o Language specified by two-letter ISO language code.

   o Language's primary use is for fuzzy matching.  System responses in
     other languages moved to client.

   o Added leading substring (LSTRING) as search constraint value.

   o LSTRING required, SUBSTRING now optional.

   o OUTCHARSET removed.

   o Clarification on which constraints are global/local.

   o Introduced boolean operators AND, OR, NOT, and ().

   o Redefined DESCRIBE and HELP.

   o Cleanup and rewriting.



Working Group Status

A new organization within the IETF has been formed to deal with
directory service issues.  As a result, a new working group has been
proposed, Access and Synchronization of the Internet Directories (ASID),
to work on directory service protocol issues.  It was recommended, and
agreed, that the WNILS Working Group should conclude, and all future
work should be performed within ASID. All activities related to closing
down WNILS will occur via electronic mail and should be complete by the
next IETF meeting.


Attendees

John Beck                jbeck@cup.hp.com
Alexis Bor               bora@ct.si.cs.boeing.com
Luc Boulianne            lucb@bunyip.com
Mic Bowman
C. Allan Cargille        allan.cargille@cs.wisc.edu
Michael Carroll          br.mjc@rlg.stanford.edu
Cyrus Chow               cchow@ames.arc.nasa.gov
Richard Everman          reverman@ka.reg.uci.edu
Jill Foster              Jill.Foster@newcastle.ac.uk
Kevin Gamiel             kgamiel@cnidr.org
Joan Gargano             jcgargano@ucdavis.edu
Judith Grass             grass@cnri.reston.va.us
Darren Hardy             hardy@cs.colorado.edu
Roland Hedberg           Roland.Hedberg@umdac.umu.se
Tim Howes                tim@umich.edu
Richard Huber            rvh@ds.internic.net
Neil Katin               katin@eng.sun.com
Jim Knowles              jknowles@binky.arc.nasa.gov
Sylvain Langlois         Sylvain.Langlois@der.edf.fr
Walter Lazear            lazear@gateway.mitre.org
Larry Masinter           masinter@parc.xerox.com
Chip Matthes             chip@delphi.com
James McKinney           jmck@americast.com
Linda Millington         l.millington@noc.ulcc.ac.uk
Paul-Andre Pays          pays@faugeres.inria.fr
Pete Percival            percival@indiana.edu
Karen Petraska-Veum      karen.veum@gsfc.nasa.gov
Jon Postel               postel@isi.edu
Thomas Powell            sestrada@aldea.com
Mark Prior               mrp@itd.adelaide.edu.au
Rickard Schoultz         schoultz@sunet.se
Michael Schwartz         schwartz@cs.colorado.edu
Mark Smith               mcs@umich.edu
Suzanne Smith            smith@es.net
Karen Sollins            sollins@lcs.mit.edu
David Staudt             dstaudt@nsf.gov
Peter Sylvester          peter.sylvester@inria.fr
Dave Thompson            davet@ncsa.uiuc.edu
Aleks Totic              atotic@ncsa.uiuc.edu
Ruediger Volk            rv@informatik.uni-dortmund.de
Chris Weider             clw@bunyip.com