LDAP schema BOF

[John Beck <[e-mail]>]

Hopefully this is of general interest to this group...

We will be holding a BOF in Orlando next Tuesday (2:15 - 3:15) on LDAP Schema
for E-mail Routing (LASER).  Below is the BOF description, a skeleton agenda,
and a short introduction by Hans Lachman of Netscape, the author of the first
draft mentioned.  A discussion list <[e-mail]> has been set
up as well.

Description
-----------
The use of LDAP is becoming increasingly popular, and the demand for
mail transfer agents (MTAs) to be able to extract relevant information is
increasing along with it.  Of particular interest is settling upon a common
schema for local email routing.  LDAP will *not* be contacted for routing
e-mail until the MTA first determines that it is listed as an MX or A record
for the host named on the right hand side of the email address.  The goal
is to define which schema to use in requesting local routing information
(a.k.a. aliasing) from an LDAP directory service.

There are currently no such standards-track specifications under review
in the IETF.  There is draft-lachman-ldap-mail-routing-03.txt, which is on
track to become an Informational RFC; parts of this may be a good start at a
standards-track specification (the focus here is narrower than in that draft).
But other proposals exist (e.g., draft-srivastava-ldap-mail-00.txt) with
similar goals but using different schema, so the time seems right for a BOF
to discuss whether an existing proposal is ready to move forward or if a
working group is merited.

Agenda
------
* Background (see above)
* Overview of existing proposals (I-Ds, Info RFCs, ...)
* Discussion of future direction
* Determination of interest for a WG, or lack thereof

Hans' Introduction
------------------
There is currently an I-D from Netscape describing their implementation
of LDAP-based mail routing, using an object class called 'mailRecipient'.
This I-D has been submitted to the RFC Editor and is being considered for
publication as an Informational RFC.  The IESG has requested that we bring
this up at the LASER BOF, so interested parties are invited to comment.
Netscape also has an I-D that describes their LDAP attributes for mail groups
processing.  Please see <http://arc.la.ca.us/laser/> for more information on
both drafts.

-- John Beck