[saag] Re: A simpler form of OID

On Wed, Sep 17, 2025 at 03:23:48PM -0400, Phillip Hallam-Baker wrote:
> On Wed, Sep 17, 2025 at 2:18 PM Nico Williams <[email protected]> wrote:
> 
> Yup. OIDs fall foul of what I call 'taxonomification', the irrational urge
> to sort everything into one true hierarchy of meaning. I hate folder based
> file storage for the same reason, the understanding of the taxonomy is
> always emergent, you end up in debates on what arcs to place the OIDs.

Sometimes it's not hierarchy of meaning but just hierarchy of
delegations.  Like I have my own PEN that I have used, and so does $WORK
that they do use.  The point of delegation is not having to interact
with a registrar that has no obligation to interact with you on a timely
basis.

But delegation creates the nightmare of not being able to resolve
things, perhaps because the delegatees don't want to share, or more
likely because a) they have no standard way to share, b) there's no way
to preserve those registrations should the delegatee go away (die, go
bankrupt, whatever).

What OIDs need is a protocol, like DNS yes, maybe, but also tools that
can just walk the DNS of OIDs and build up cached tables that are
actually useful.

But OIDs are not quite so painful that we're ever going to build such a
thing.

> > I'd like this to have more general applicability and to be able to
> > reserve sub-namespaces to specific protocols, just as with OIDs we
> > can reserve sub-namespaces to registrants.  Then IANA would only accept
> > registrations in those sub-namespaces if they are for the same
> > protocols.
> 
> I would accept that as a matter of registry convenience, provided we didn't
> burn all the short prefixes on codes that are not going to be user facing.

Sure, I see.  Well, that's the trade-off if we generalize: can't
guarantee tiny codes for the most commonly used things.  So I'll just
withdraw that suggestion that this be more general.

Nico
-- 

_______________________________________________
saag mailing list -- [email protected]
To unsubscribe send an email to [email protected]