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1993-12-31
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Some comments on the "H"ierarchical Continent Address Designator
_________________
Tom Clark, W3IWI
6388 Guilford Road
Clarksville, MD 21029
At the risk of opening Pandorra's Box, this note suggests a change in the
2-character continent designator portion of the PBBS "H" hierarchical
address field. An example would be the North America .NA portion of the
packet address,
K9DOG @ W6SIX.DE.USA.NA
Let me state at the outset that I'm not convinced that we need to use the
continent field. It seems to me that the country field by itself is ade-
quate and that the packet BBSes can easily keep track of all the countries
in the world. Let me also state that many of the issues addressed here
arise because of constant confusion between the functions of addressing
and routing.
The correct continent to assign to many countries of the world is confus-
ing and/or ambiguous. To cite some examples of problems which have already
been identified:
- 5B4=Cyprus in the Mediterranian is listed by the IARU (for WAC)
and the ITU as Asia. Ditto 4X=Israel and JY=Jordan in the middle
East.
- Both TA=Turkey and and the Soviet Union have part of their coun-
ties in Europe and part in Asia. 8Q6=Maldives is listed as both
Africa and Asia. Several other countries are also "split".
- Although DU=Philipines and YB=Indonesia are regarded as Asiatic
countries, the are listed as Oceania, along with Australia and
Hawaii. If you venture to 9M=Malasia, you may be in either Ocea-
nia or Asia.
- The Central American and Carribean countries are nearly all part
of North America, including YV0, but not 9Y. Anyone care to guess
what continent the southern part of HP=Panama is in?
If the purpose of the continent portion of the "H"ierarchical address is
to facilitate delivery of messages, then it is illogical to route Israeli
and Jordanian traffic through the Orient. It is illogical to make automat-
ed routing decisions for messages to Turkish amateurs based on whether the
addressee is on the east or west side of the Straits of Bosporus.
Stations in Israel and Cyprus already face this dilemma. Rather than using
a .AS Asian address, they choose to use .EU European designator to avoid
having their packet mail routed via the Orient. Some have suggested the
use of a new continent designator other than .AS; One suggestion has
been .ME (Middle East) but this has a serious conflict with the state of
Maine.
The Central Americans and the Carribean are both "legally" .NA but feel
they need a separate geographic identity and both areas have independently
suggested the use of .CA but this would conflict with .CA state.
All this leads to my suggestion that the present 2-letter continent desig-
nator must be changed. Either:
(1) The present 2-character designator should be dropped because it
it not really needed and there are too many ambiguities. Users
will always try to use address quirks to force routing, so don't
give them the chance to foul things up. The computers at the
international mail gateways can easily handle the entire DXCC
list.
- or -
(2) A new logical regional designator which allows sub-continent
sized regions should be adopted.
If a new, more flexible scheme is to be adopted, I'd suggest that new 4-
character designators be chosen:
- .NOAM, .SOAM, .CEAM, .CARB replacing the present .NA & .SA and
solving the Central American and Carribean problem,
- .ASIA replacing .AS for the Orient,
- .MDLE for the middle-eastern countries like 4X, JY etc.,
- Oceania divided into smaller areas like .NPAC, .SPAC, .AUST,
- The Indian ocean (now partly in .OC and partly in .AF) be desig-
nated .INDI,
- .AFRI replacing .AF for Africa and .EURO replacing .EU for
Europe,
- .ANTR added for Antarctica,
- Additional new designators added as needed for sub-continent
sized logical areas.
This scheme affords the logic of a 2-character field (.MD) for the
"state", 3 characters (.DEU) for the country, & 4 (.AFRI) for the conti-
nent/subcontinent and avoids conflicts between state-sized areas and
continents. Who knows, a few decades hence a 5 character field
(.EARTH, .VENUS) may be needed too!