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INTERNET-DRAFT
Network Working Group A. Marine
Request For Comments: XXXX NASA NAIC
FYI: XX June 1993
Current NIC Interrelationships
Status of This Memo
This document is an Internet-Draft. Internet-Drafts are working
documents of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), its Areas,
and its Working Groups. Note that other groups may also distribute
working documents as Internet-Drafts. Internet-Drafts are draft
documents valid for a maximum of six months. Internet-Drafts may be
updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any time. It
is not appropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference material or to
cite them other than as a "working draft" or "work in progress."
Comments on the following draft may be submitted to
April Marine (amarine@atlas.arc.nasa.gov).
This memo provides information for the Internet community. It does
not specify an Internet standard. Distribution of this memo is
unlimited.
Abstract
Recently there have been significant changes in the manner in which
Internet information services are provided. The goal of this
document is to provide a brief snapshot of the roles and
relationships of current Network Information Centers (NICs).
Acknowledgments
This document reflects the work of the Network Information Services
Infrastructure (NISI) working group in the User Services area of the
IETF. Because the working group participants represent a cross-
section of existing Internet NICs, the opinions expressed herein are
representative of groups currently providing information services
within the Internet community.
Special thanks....
Introduction
The recent growth of the Internet over the last several years has
been accompanied by a trend toward a distributed system of
information services providers. Long gone are the days of one
centralized NIC for the whole Internet. Today almost every entity
in the world that supports internetworking, be it a government agency
or a private access provider, provides its users with some type
of NIC. Recently, the National Science Foundation in the U.S.
awarded its "NSFNET and NREN Information Services" contract to
three cooperating companies, each of which has responsibility
for a different general task (information services, registration
services, or directory services). The structure of this award
has added some confusion to the question of where the scope of
one NIC ends and another's begins.
This question is of vital importance to the participants in the
Network Information Services Infrastructre (NISI) working group. A
consensus of agreement between NISI WG members is essential to
furthering our goal of establishing and supporting cooperative
bonds between NICs of all types. We thought that, if NISI members
were confused on this question, others in the Internet community
would probably also be confused, and that a synopsis of our
agreements on this topic would be of interest to the community.
Two points need to be clear. First, when we refer to a "NIC" or a
"center" we mean some group who has as all or part of its function
the task of providing information services. Such "centers" can be
as informal as one person on staff who has as one of her job
responsibilities the task of keeping up with Internet services and
answering local questions about them.
Second, often such centers, be they large or small, formal or
informal, have responsibilities in addition to information
services. The primary example of such an additional task is
providing support for Internet registration services, such as the
local assignment of IP network numbers or the maintenance of domain
names. Directory services, such as the registration of white pages
information in a server, is another task that many NICs undertake.
Many NICs also double as Network Operations Centers (NOCs). Each
separate task a NIC undertakes draws it into a distinct web of
relationships among other providers of that service and under
those responsible for coordinating such services, if any such
coordination exists. This paper focuses on the web of relationships
an Internet NIC experiences with the task of providing information
services.
The Situation Today
The main impetus for the NISI WG considering this question was the
recent creation of the InterNIC, the term used to designate the
three cooperative agencies awarded the NSF service provider
contract. The information services portion of this contract was
awarded to General Atomics/CERFNet. The question was, "How does
the InterNIC information services provider relate to the NICs
already established?" After some discussion, we agreed that
the InterNIC provider was a peer to the other Level 2 NICs.
A Level 1 NIC is a center whose primary responsibility is answering
questions posed by network users. A Level 2 NIC is a center whose
primary responsbility is supporting Level 1 NICs. Each Level 2
NIC, however, will inevitably support some Level 1 activities, i.e.
answer questions directly from users. (Entities other than Level 2
NICs provide Level 2 support to NICs, by the way. The User
Services Area of the IETF, the RARE Information Services and User
Support (ISUS) group, and the NISI working group are also Level 2
activities.)
So, if you're a user, how do you know if "your" NIC is a Level 1
NIC or a Level 2 NIC? The answer is that it doesn't matter--just
ask your question and trust the NIC to handle it appropriately.
The distinction just means that some NICs are tasked to support
others. For example, the InterNIC information services provider
acts as a resource for other mid-level NICs in the NSFNET hiearchy.
NASA's Network Applications and Information Center (NAIC) is
tasked to provide similar support to NICs at NASA Centers.
A Picture
Here is the picture the NISI working group agreed represented
the current relationships for information services. The top
level only shows a few representative NICs; there are many
more there.
----------- ------- ------- ------- ------- -------- --------------
|InterNIC |<->| DDN |<->|RIPE |<->|NASA |<->|JNIC |<->| APNIC|<->|"Commercial"|
|info svcs| | NIC | | NCC | |NAIC | | | | | | NICs |
----------- ------- ------- ------- ------- -------- --------------
/ / \ \ / / \ \ / / \ \ / / \ \
mid-level NICs country NASA Center constituent
campus NICs NICs NICs NICs
\ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
users
In fact, this picture might better be drawn "upside down", with the
"users" at the top of the picture, because this design does not
represent a hierarchy of importance of influence, but rather a
foundation of support. Users ask for help as locally as possible;
many of these local NICs have the support of Level 2 NICs. All
NICs have the support of such groups as NISI and ISUS. Therefore,
the ultimate benefit is that the user has the support of this whole
system of interrelated NICs and NIC support functions. It is this
system of relationships the NISI group is chartered to foster and
formalize.
Finding Out More About NICs
One of the ongoing projects of the NISI working group has been
the collection of NIC Profile information so that both NICs
and users can more easily find out what services are available
to them.
<info from Pat re collecting and accessing NIC Profiles>
Security Considerations
Security considerations are not considered in this memo.
References
RFC 1302 "Building a Network Information Services Infrastructure"
Authors' Addresses
April Marine
Network Applications and Information Center
NASA Ames Research Center
M/S 233-18
Moffett Field, CA 94035-1000
Phone: 415 604 0762
Email: amarine@atlas.arc.nasa.gov
This Internet Draft expires December 30, 1993.