Re: [Ideas] New revision posted on draft-ccm-ideas-identity-use-cases

[Alexander Clemm <[e-mail]>]

Hello Tom,

Thank you for your comments.  Some brief replies, inline, <ALEX>

--- Alex

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Tom Herbert [mailto:[e-mail]]


...

> By my count this is at least the fifth definition of identity that has been
> proposed either in drafts or on the list, and this one is no more enlightening
> than any of the previous definitions. First of all, this says identity is an
> "identifier". Does this mean that identity is a type of identifier per the
> definition of identifier above? Secondly, this says identity is used to identify a
> communication entity, however above it says an identifier "denotes
> information to unambiguously identify a communications entity"-- so both of
> them "identify a communications entity"... I don't see the difference.

<ALEX> Well, the definitions are evolving as we hope to get them more concise.  

For that definition: yes, the IDy is an identifier.  However, it is a "special" identifier in that it is never revealed in packet header, nor revealed to another communications entity - unlike an IDf.  

Another aspect that is mentioned in the draft, but not in the definitions (and we need to revisit this) concerns the distinction between a "second-order" (IDf) and a "first-order" identifier (IDy) - the second-order potentially be rooted / anchored in the first-order identifier, respectively the first-order identifier really denoting a collection / grouping of "second-order" identifiers.  As mentioned below, perhaps  we should add an articulation such as "" An IDy serves as a collection of identifiers that are associated with the same endpoint"

</ALEX>

> 
> The rest of the draft, including the picture of the relationship between
> identifiers, identify, and locators, seems to imply a potentially more useful
> and crisp definition of identity. As stated in the introduction: "An IDy serves
> as a collection of identifiers that are associated with the same endpoint". This
> could be rephrased to define identity as "a group of identifiers that share
> some common properties". Given this "group" definition of identity, then it
> becomes natural to consider group policy and group operations over sets of
> identifiers.
> 

<ALEX> I am glad that you find that things are getting crisper - I take it to mean that we are on the right path!  Yes, this is what we need to reflect / incorporate.  However, I think we need to be more specific than just saying IDy refers to a grouping in the general sense - it refers to a grouping of identifiers that refer to the same communications entity  (that is the property they have in common, I guess) 
</ALEX>