The UK COSINE X.500 Directory Pilot Colin Robbins X-Tel Services Ltd _A_B_S_T_R_A_C_T This note describes the UK COSINE X.500 Directory Pilot, how organisations can become involved in the pilot, the services offered to sites wishing to participate in the pilot and the steps that need to taken to become connected into the pilot directory information tree. _1. _B_a_c_k_g_r_o_u_n_d For nearly two years there has been an academic X.500 Pilot Project sponsored by the JNT. The initial aims of the pro- ject were a) to provide users with white pages look up of postal and electric contact information of other academic users and b) to gain experience and understanding of the technical issues involved in managing large scale distri- buted directories. This pilot has now become part of a European X.500 Paradise Project under the COSINE initiative. It is also linked with other national pilots, including the White Pages Project in the US, and the Australian X.500 pro- ject. As well as providing a white pages services for users, the global pilot is now being used to provide OSI host informa- tion for support of X.400 and FTAM applications. Currently, the JNT UK pilot is academic based, with a few corporate representatives. At a meeting of these represen- tatives and representatives of the JNT it was decided to expand the scope of the pilot to allow and encourage commer- cial participation in the pilot. X-Tel Services Ltd were asked to act as the Registration Authority for this pilot, bearing in mind they already support the existing academic pilot. _2. _J_o_i_n_i_n_g _t_h_e _X._5_0_0 _P_i_l_o_t To become fully connected in the pilot an organisation will need to register their involvement with X-Tel. To register May 14, 1991 - 2 - you will need to be running an X.500 Directory System Agent (DSA) which holds data representing your organisation. You must be prepared to make some of your organisational tele- phone and/or email data publicly available for other pilot sites to look at via the X.500 protocol (that is allow them to read data explicitly made available to them). In return the other sites have a commitment to making their data available to you. The DSA should be available via either X.25 over PSPDN (PSS, Janet, IXI...) or the Internet (using RFC-1006 over TCP/IP). _2._1. _C_h_o_i_c_e _o_f _R_e_l_a_t_i_v_e _D_i_s_t_i_n_g_u_i_s_h_e_d _N_a_m_e At the time of writing, there is not an official UK Name Registration Authority. The draft documents discussing such an authority suggest that RDNs will be the registered name of the company, for example "X-Tel Services Ltd", with the organizationalName attribute being used to hold the name. The pilot will adopt this policy, resolving any clashes as and when they occur by discussion with the relevant parties. _2._2. _L_e_v_e_l _i_n _t_h_e _D_I_T You can be registered at the c=GB level of the DIT, or if you organisation is not a national one, and you do not wish to be registered under the c=GB node of the tree, you can opt to be registered under a locality, for example "c=GB, locality=Nottingham". Again the draft UK Naming document says localities will be formed using Postal District names defined by the Post Office, the pilot will adopt this pol- icy. _2._3. _C_o_s_t The annual fee for registration under the c=GB node or under a locality is 100|-. For this X-Tel will register your organisation in the pilot, thus making your data available to other participating sites. X-Tel will supply you with connection information so you can access the data from others organisations involved in the pilot. You will also be offered some limited support to help maintain the service. You will be able to update your registration once made. _________________________ |-All fees mentioned in this note are based on the use of existing COSINE facilities in a pilot service, and are subject to alteration. The fees do not apply to sites covered by the JNT directory support contract. May 14, 1991 - 3 - _3. _D_a_t_a _P_r_o_t_e_c_t_i_o_n _A_c_t All data in your DSA should be registered under the Data Protection Act for world wide access. There was quite some debate on this subject in the JNT academic pilot and involved discussions with the Data Protection Registrar. A proforma registration acceptable to the Data Protection Registrar and the pilot's needs was generated and is avail- able to interested parties from X-Tel. X-Tel will assume all organisations registering in the pilot have suitable data protection registrations. _3._1. _U_s_e _o_f _D_a_t_a There is an informal agreement amongst the academic sites that data found in the directory is for personal use only, for example to get the telephone number of somebody you want to call. By registering your organisation in the pilot, you are seen to have agreed to this principle. Any use of the data for generating mailing lists or the like, without per- mission of the recipients is frowned upon and strongly discouraged. Any abuse of this agreement or violation of the Data Protec- tion Act as determined by the Pilot management committee may result in removal of the offending organisation from the pilot. _4. _R_e_g_i_s_t_e_r_i_n_g _a_n _O_r_g_a_n_i_s_a_t_i_o_n To register your organisation you will need to supply X-Tel with the Distinguished Name you wish your organisation the be registered with, the Distinguished Name of your DSA, and the OSI address of your DSA. This information will the be added into the X.500 knowledge database of a central GB DSA. This knowledge can then be accessed by other participating sites using the X.500 protocols. In return, you will be given the access information to the central GB DSA, enabling you to access the data from the other pilot sites. This DSA will also have knowledge of other countries participating in the global pilot, allowing you to access them as well. Having registered your organisation you have a commitment to making your DSA(s) available to the other pilot sites. DSAs which are consistently unavailable may be de-registered from the pilot. _4._1. _P_l_a_c_e _h_o_l_d_e_r_s If you do not have a DSA service running, but wish to regis- ter your organisation, you can supply X-Tel with you May 14, 1991 - 4 - organisation information which will be registered in the directory as a place holder. There is an annual charge of 100|- for this service. _4._2. _R_e_m_o_t_e _D_S_A If you do not have the facilities to run a DSA, X-Tel may be able to run a DSA on your behalf. Contact X-Tel for further details. _5. _R_e_p_l_i_c_a_t_i_o_n An important part of the Pilot service is replication. Replication is not covered by the X.500(88) protocol. How- ever, the pilot service achieves replication using the pro- tocol defined in the document "Replication to provide an Internet Directory using X.500: A proposed solution" submit- ted as an Internet Draft (copies available from X-Tel). X-Tel can offer replication services of the root of the DIT, and most of the countries registered below the root. This means will X-Tel hold copies of the root and most of the country level Entry Data Block (EDB) files, and make copies available to you via the Internet Draft replication proto- col. The annual cost of replication facilities is a flat fee of 50|-, plus a fee of 10|- per Entry Data Block required (one fee per EDB per year). If you register for countries other than c=GB, X-Tel will provide a tracking service to advise you when a new country is added, and see if you want to replicate the data. _6. _D_S_A _R_e_l_a_y_i_n_g. Currently there are two major networks involved in the glo- bal pilot - International X.25 and the Internet. (IXI in Europe and JANET in the UK are also widely used.) If your DSA is only connected to one of these networks there is a DSA Relay service. This is a DSA that has access to all these networks and is prepared to chain queries to DSA on one network on behalf of your DSA which only has access to another. Initially the COSINE DSA Relay will be used for this service. _7. _D_U_A _a_c_c_e_s_s If you do not have the facilities to run a DSA, X-Tel can provide details of the COSINE access point for a DUA to con- nect to. Similarly, if you do not have the facilities to run a DUA, May 14, 1991 - 5 - X-Tel can provide details of the COSINE public access DUA accessible via X.25 Pad or Telnet on the Internet. _8. _E_l_e_c_t_r_o_n_i_c _M_a_i_l_i_n_g _L_i_s_t_s There are two mailing lists concerning the directory pilot. _G_B-_D_i_r-_P_i_l_o_t@_x_t_e_l._c_o._u_k is used to discuss operational issues affecting commercial sites participating in the pilot service. DSA availability and DIT size statistics are sent to this list. (This is similar to the Directory-Pilot@rutherford.ac.uk list used to discuss opera- tion issues relating to the academic pilot.) You should send a message to _G_B-_D_i_r-_P_i_l_o_t-_R_e_q_u_e_s_t@_x_t_e_l._c_o._u_k to join this list. _D_i_r_e_c_t_o_r_y-_G_r_o_u_p@_r_u_t_h_e_r_f_o_r_d._a_c._u_k is used to discuss the wider issues of the X.500 pilot. Operational problems should not be discussed on this list. You should send a message to _D_i_r_e_c_t_o_r_y-_G_r_o_u_p-_R_e_q_u_e_s_t@_r_u_t_h_e_r_f_o_r_d._a_c._u_k to join this list. _9. _C_o_n_s_u_l_t_a_n_c_y Experience with the UK Academic Pilot has shown that setting up a DSA requires a reasonable level of technical expertise. X-Tel Services can offer consultancy to help sites without sufficient expertise join the pilot and can offer extended support arrangements above the limited support offered in the initial registration fee. X-Tel can supply UNIX based X.500 software consisting of a DSA and a range of DUAs. Details on request. _1_0. _C_o_n_t_a_c_t_i_n_g _X-_T_e_l Post: X.500 Directory Project, X-Tel Services Ltd, University Park, Nottingham, NG7 2RD Telephone: +44 602 412648 Fax: +44 602 790278 E-Mail: x500@xtel.co.uk X.400: /c=GB/ADMD=GOLD 400/PRMD=X-Tel Services Ltd/o=X-Tel/S=x500/ X.400: /c=GB/ADMD= /PRMD=X-Tel Services Ltd/o=X-Tel/S=x500/ May 14, 1991