Bunyip Internet Directory Project
Charles Fisher <chuck@aix3090b.uky.edu> Thu, 28 October 1993 19:12 UTC
Received: from ietf.nri.reston.va.us by IETF.CNRI.Reston.VA.US id aa13657; 28 Oct 93 15:12 EDT
Received: from CNRI.RESTON.VA.US by IETF.CNRI.Reston.VA.US id aa13653; 28 Oct 93 15:12 EDT
Received: from mocha.bunyip.com by CNRI.Reston.VA.US id aa19214; 28 Oct 93 15:12 EDT
Received: by mocha.bunyip.com (5.65a/IDA-1.4.2b/CC-Guru-2b) id AA03556 on Thu, 28 Oct 93 12:43:06 -0400
Received: from aix3090B.uky.edu by mocha.bunyip.com with SMTP (5.65a/IDA-1.4.2b/CC-Guru-2b) id AA03552 (mail destined for /usr/lib/sendmail -odq -oi -fiafa-request iafa-out) on Thu, 28 Oct 93 12:42:58 -0400
Received: by aix3090b.uky.edu (5.61-AIX-1.2/1.0) id AA327755 (for iafa@bunyip.com, from chuck/chuck@aix3090b.uky.edu); Thu, 28 Oct 93 12:41:56 GMT
Message-Id: <9310281241.AA327755@aix3090b.uky.edu>
Sender: ietf-archive-request@IETF.CNRI.Reston.VA.US
From: Charles Fisher <chuck@aix3090b.uky.edu>
Date: Thu, 28 Oct 1993 12:41:55 -0400
X-Mailer: Mail User's Shell (7.2.0 10/31/90)
To: systems@ukcc.uky.edu, O@aix3090b.uky.edu, riginal-To: iafa@bunyip.com;
MMDF-Warning: Parse error in original version of preceding line at CNRI.Reston.VA.US
Subject: Bunyip Internet Directory Project
>Subject: Bunyip Internet Directory Project
>Path: ukma!wupost!howland.reston.ans.net!spool.mu.edu!umn.edu!news2.cis.umn.edu!gopher-news-daemon@boombox.micro.umn.edu >Message-ID: <9310281459.AA00719@mocha.bunyip.com> >From: bajan@bunyip.com (Alan Emtage) >Date: Thu, 28 Oct 1993 10:59:36 -0400 >Mime-Version: 1.0 >Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII >X-Mailer: Mail User's Shell (7.2.3 5/22/91) >Original-To: iafa@bunyip.com >Subject: Bunyip Internet Directory Project >Original-Cc: iiir@merit.edu, www-talk@nxoc01.cern.ch, wais-talk@quake.think.com, > gopher-news@boombox.micro.umn.edu, archie-people@bunyip.com, > srs@merit.edu, pacs-l@uhupvm1.uh.edu, nir@mailbase.ac.uk, > ietf-wnils@ucdavis.edu, uri@bunyip.com >Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gopher >Distribution: comp >Sender: news@news2.cis.umn.edu >Approved: comp.infosystems.gopher@news.cis.umn.edu >Lines: 165 >Xref: ukma comp.infosystems.gopher:7952 [This message is being posted to several mailing lists. My apologies for the duplication] Over the next several months we at Bunyip Information Systems (creators of the archie directory system), will be running a pilot project to assess the viability of collecting additional data cataloging information directly from the Internet. Ultimately, this information will be made available to the Internet community via the distribution mechanisms now in place for the familiar archie anonymous FTP database. One of the biggest problems currently facing the use of the wealth of information now available on the Internet is locating the files, documents or services that you are looking for. While archie goes some way to addressing this problem, "cataloging" information such as contact information, abstracts, descriptions, keywords and access policies for the files and services are simply not available through simple filename searches. The problem of trying to keep this cataloging information up to date manually in such a dynamic environment is well illustrated by the current archie Software Description Database (or "whatis" database as it is more commonly known). We are asking you, the anonymous FTP archive site administrators and operators of Internet services to cooperate with us by preparing your information for automated gathering and serving. In doing so, we believe you will be supporting a data distribution model that is well suited to the Internet. Control over your content will remain with you, and the automatic preparation of additional information services will be made possible. The data served to the community will be updated when you change your own files. You need not tell us that you have these files or inform us when they have changed: if you have asked for your anonymous FTP archive to be part of the archie service in the past, this information will be automatically retrieved from your archive. Our project will use an extended version of the archie system to collect data "templates" on anonymous FTP archives. These templates will be automatically retrieved, collated and indexed into a form easily searchable by users on the network. Over the period of the pilot a number of search and retrieval techniques will be assessed to determine their usability. The hope is that the general user will be able to query this database and obtain descriptive information about freely available or Public Domain documents, images, sounds and services on the network...worldwide. In addition to the descriptions, the templates point the user to the source of the original data or service which may then be accessed. By filling out and making these templates available for retrieval, you can advertise the files and services available from your department or institution. The templates can be used to describe Services The archive can offer an overall description of each the various Internet services offered by your organization's systems, along with corresponding contact information. This description would then indicate whether the the parent organization offers such services as: o on-line library catalogues o Interactive online information services such as WAIS, gopher, Prospero, World Wide Web or archie o specialized information servers such as those providing weather, geographic information, newswire feeds etc. o Other information services People By putting non-sensitive personal contact information into the templates we hope to provide the start of the first truly global White Pages service: the ability to locate people anywhere on the network. Documents, Datasets, Mailing List Archives, USETNET Archives, Software Packages, Images and other Objects You might wish to make available a brief description of available software, documents, images, sounds, video, datasets, USENET archives and mailing list information through the anonymous FTP archive. A typical "services" template might look like this (no offense to the Census Bureau intended :-) Template-Type: SERVICES Name: Census Bureau information server Host-Name: census.ispy.gov Host-Port: 1234 Protocol: telnet Admin-Name: Jay Bond Admin-Postal: PO Box. 42, A Street Washington DC, USA 20001 Admin-Work-Phone: +1-202-222-3333 Admin-Work-Fax: +1 202 444 5555 Admin-Email: jb007@census.ispy.gov Description: This server provides information from the latest USA Census Bureau statistics (1990) Type "help" for more information. Authentication: Once connected type your email address at the "login:" prompt. No password is required. Registration: No formal registration is required Charging-Policy: There is no charge for the use of this service Access-Times: 9:00 EST / 17:00 EST Access-Policy: This service may not be used by sites in the Republic of the VTTS Keywords: census, population, 1990, statistics Last-Modified-Name: Miss Moneypenny Last-Modified-Email: m.moneypenny@census.ispy.gov Last-Modified-Date: Wed, 1 Jan 1970 12:00:00 GMT Note that the machine on which the actual service or documents reside need not be the same as that of the anonymous FTP archive: you may place these templates on any anonymous FTP archive. The template contains the date on where to locate the information itself. The templates to be used will be those constructed by the Internet Anonymous FTP Archives working group of the Internet Engineering Task Force. These documents describing the templates are available as Internet Drafts from the standard network repositories. They are also available from archive.cc.mcgill.ca in the pub/Network/iafa directory. The two files are draft-ietf-iafa-publish-00.txt and draft-ietf-iafa-templates-00.txt the templates themselves are generally extensible and you may add fields if you do not think that the ones provided suit your particular needs. Please do not be put off by the size of the documents: the first contains several examples explaining and illustrating how they are filled out; the second provides empty templates for you to use. Also, do not feel that you are obliged to complete one of every template or even every field in each template. We ask only that you document current practice at your site as completely as possible. If you have any questions about this project or suggestions about the templates, we would be happy to answer them. Please send mail to templates-info@bunyip.com Please feel free to redistribute this message to groups you think appropriate. -- -Alan ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Alan Emtage, "The Left in Canada is more gauche Bunyip Information Systems, than sinister" Montreal, CANADA -The Economist bajan@bunyip.com Voice: +1 (514) 875-8611 Fax: +1 (514) 875-8134 -- Chuck Fisher chuck@aix3090b.uky.edu This space reserved for future pithy comment
- Bunyip Internet Directory Project Charles Fisher