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. 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.