Subject: I-D ACTION:draft-sun-handle-system-00.txt

From: [email-masked]
Date: Thu, 20 Nov 1997 09:27:41 -0500

A New Internet-Draft is available from the on-line Internet-Drafts directories.

	Title		: Handle System: A Persistent Global 
                          Naming Service Overview and Syntax
	Author(s)	: S. Sun
	Filename	: draft-sun-handle-system-00.txt
	Pages		: 9
	Date		: 18-Nov-97
	
   The Handle System (r) is a comprehensive system  for assigning,
   managing, and resolving persistent identifiers, known as
   ''handles,'' for digital objects and other resources on the Internet.
   Handles can be used as Uniform Resource Names (URNs). The Handle
   System includes:(a) an open set of protocols, (b) a namespace,
   and (c) an implementation of the protocols. The protocols enable
   a distributed computer system to store handles of digital
   resources and resolve those handles into the information necessary
   to locate and access the resources. This associated information
   can be changed as needed to reflect the current state of the
   identified resource without changing the handle, thus allowing the
   name of the item to persist over changes of location and other
   state information. Combined with a centrally administered naming
   authority registration service, the Handle System provides a
   general purpose, distributed global naming service for the reliable
   management of information on networks over long periods of time.
   (Note that in this document we do not attempt to distinguish
   between the terms 'name' and 'indentifier' and will use them
   interchangably.)
 
   The Handle System has been implemented and is currently in use in
   a number of prototype projects, including efforts with the Library
   of Congress, the Association of American Publishers, the Defense 
   Technical Information Center, and the United States Information
   Agency.
 
   This is the first of a series of planned documents that will
   specify the handle protocol and services, and relate the Handle
   System to other IETF activities in URN/URI/URL working groups.
   This document provides a concise overview of the system and the
   syntax of handles. Additional information can be found on CNRI
   and related project web sites [4, 5, 6, 8, 16, 17, 18, 19].

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