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RE: Basic Cert-2-Directory mapping question

Bob,

Skip, as you correctly point out, the problem is not so great in the case
of an organization that operates its own DNS domain, and uses that domain
as the means of providing directory service access. Certainly a company
like Novell, Lockheed, GTE (oops, Verizon), etc., could easily do so.

But notice some of the problems. I'm not picking on our esteemed co-chair, but
notice that Steve's e-mail address, kent@xxxxxxx, is two corporate mergers
behind the times, since GTE acquired BBN, and then Verizon was formed out
of GTE and Bell Atlantic. But if his certificate were deposited at something like
directory.verizon.com, how would you extract that from the BBN name?
would all of those older e-mail address have to have a set of alias DNS names for
the directory server?

Life is a bit more complicated than your example suggests. I still work at BBN, BBN Technologies, a part of Verizon. We still own the domain name BBN, and we're getting our own logo again, so mergers and acquisitions don't always warrant wholesale changes! My GTE colleagues probably do need to change over to new, Verizon e-mail addresses, over time, but not instantly. The GTE and Bell Atlantic logo change will be phased over about 2 years, in the physical arena, so one could expect a similar grace period in cyberspace. Also, it would not be unreasonable for a Verizon directory to provide links to BBN, just as people often maintain multiple e-mail addresses, with appropriate internal links, to smooth over transitions of this sort. (I'm kent@xxxxxxx, but skent@xxxxxxx works, and stephen.kent@xxxxxxx works too!)

<snip>


Steve