CURRENT_MEETING_REPORT_


Reported by Dana Sitzler/Merit

NISI Minutes

Agenda

Current Meeting Agenda:


   o Recap of last meeting
   o Draft document
   o Discussion:  Relationship between NIC's/Cooperative Agreements


Minutes:

The session began with a recap of the last NISI meeting which included
discussions about where we are today in terms of network information
services.  A draft document summarizing these discussions will be sent
to the NISI mailing list prior to the next meeting.

The session then moved into a new discussion area namely how do we
propose that NICs work together to provide information services to the
internet community.

Discussion:


   o How should NICs work together?
   o What kind of cooperative agreements can we suggest?


The idea is that NISI (or the IETF) could ``encourage'' NICs to
``formally'' work together for the benefit of network users -- in much
the same way people are encouraged to follow the technical
specifications to `play' in the internet.  The discussion then moved
onto; what are the rules that NICs should follow?

The result of this discussion was a set of suggested guidelines for
NICs:


   o WILL ANSWER TO BEST OF ABILITY BEFORE PASSING OFF
   o NIC PHONE SHALL ALWAYS BE ANSWERED
   o WILL PROVIDE AN INDEX OF SERVICES
   o WILL PROVIDE REFERRAL FILES
   o NIC'S SHOULD KEEP OTHER NIC'S INFORMED OF ``SPECIALTIES''
   o TRY TO PUT INFORMATION ON-LINE AND PROVIDE;

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      -  ACCESS
      -  UPDATE
      -  ANNOUNCEMENTS
   o PARTICIPATE IN NIC FORUM AND PLAY BY RULES
   o MAKE INFO AS WIDELY AVAILABLE AS POSSIBLE (COPYRIGHT TO MAINTAIN
     INTEGRITY OF INFORMATION, BUT STRIVE TO ENCOURAGE DISTRIBUTION --
     NOT NECESSARILY INTENDED TO IMPLY ``FREE'')
   o ACKNOWLEDGE INFO SOURCE (THEREFORE, NOT LIABLE)
   o DON'T MAKE UP ANSWERS
   o OBLIGATED TO ANSWER? (IN SOME WAY)


While discussing these guidelines, other ideas were generated about ways
of implementing them and general suggestions for improving the ability
of NICs to know about each other and to work together.  These ideas
included:


   o List of NIC's
   o Index of Services
   o Referral Contacts
   o NIC Forum (mailing list)
   o Interface to encourage electronic use, in place of paper
   o Database -- pull out info, put in another database for your system
   o Some kind of way to do referrals
   o Programs to access NIC's
   o NICs should implement a common address name such as (NIC@DOMAIN) to
     give users a place to start


The group decided to publish the suggested guidelines as an FYI-RFC. The
guidelines will be further developed, put into RFC format, and a draft
will be distributed to the NISI mailing list before the next IETF
meeting.

Follow-up actions:



Dana          Create a NIC Forum Mailing List
              -- Send draft document (of last meeting)
              -- Send recommended guidelines list
Gary          Create a Template
Mike          Bitnic Listserv
Joyce         Edit/provide input for submission of RFC
Others        Send ``other projects'' (Building blocks)



Attendees

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Carol Farnham            carolf@mcescher.unl.edu
Russell Hobby            rdhobby@ucdavis.edu
Michael Hrybyk           mwh@educom.edu
Erik Huizer              huizer@surfnet.nl
Clifford Lynch           lynch@postgres.berkeley.edu
Gary Malkin              gmalkin@ftp.com
Berlin Moore             prepnet@andrew.cmu.edu
Fred Ostapik             ostapik@nisc.sri.com
Craig Partridge          craig@nnsc.nsf.net
Cecilia Preston          ceal@asylum.sf.ca.us
Joyce K. Reynolds        jkrey@venera.isi.edu
Mark Seger               seger@mjs1/ogo.dec.com
Jim Sheridan             jsherida@ibm.com
Dana Sitzler             dds@merit.edu
Allen Sturtevant         sturtevant@ccc.nmfecc.gov



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