RFC 1348

RFC 1348: DNS NSAP RRs 💖

okay bestie, so this is RFC 1348, called DNS NSAP RRs 🎀 It's from the Network Working Group and was written by B. Manning (that's Bill Manning) at Rice University in July 1992. It's an Experimental Protocol, and it updates RFCs 1034 and 1035. It doesn't list anything it obsoletes. Let's get into it 🦋

---

Status of this Memo 📜

This memo is an Experimental Protocol for the Internet community ✨ It's asking for discussion and suggestions for improvement. For the standardization state and status of this protocol, check the current edition of the "IAB Official Protocol Standards" 🔍 Distribution of this memo is unlimited 🌈

Table of Contents 🧚

   Introduction .....................................................  1
   Background .......................................................  1
   NSAP RR ..........................................................  2
   NSAP-PTR RR ......................................................  2
   REFERENCES and BIBLIOGRAPHY ......................................  3
   Security Considerations ..........................................  4
   Author's Address .................................................  4

Introduction ✨

okay so this RFC makes two brand-new Resource Records (RRs) for the Domain Name System (DNS) 💅 It also reserves matching DNS type mnemonics and numerical codes for them. The format can be used with any proposal that has variable length addresses, but it's really targeted at CLNP use 🫶

This memo assumes you already know the DNS [3,4], so if you're new, go read those first 📚

Background 🌸

This section explains an experimental way to represent NSAP addresses in the DNS 🧪 There are several reasons to try this, and the first one is that it gives you simple documentation of the correct addresses to use in static configurations of CLNP compliant hosts and routers 💜

NSAP support needs a new DNS resource record entry type, called "NSAP", to store longer Internet (i.e., NSAP) addresses 🔥 This RR lets you map DNS names to NSAP addresses. It'll have entries for systems that can run Internet applications over TCP or UDP, over CLNP 👑

The backward translation, from NSAP address to DNS name, is handled by an associated resource record called "NSAP-PTR" 🔄 It works the same way as the existing "in-addr.arpa" 😌

These RRs are meant for a proposal [6] from one of the members of the NOOP WG, which is all about the next-generation internet 🚀

---

The NSAP RR 💎

The NSAP RR uses the mnemonic NSAP and type code 22 (decimal) 🍓

An NSAP (Network Service Access Protocol) number is a unique string for the OSI transport service 🫧

The numbering plan follows RFC 1237 and the associated OSI definitions for NSAP format 📖

The NSAP format looks like this:

<owner> <ttl> <class> NSAP <length> <NSAP-address>

All fields are required. 💅

<length> tells you how many octets are in the <NSAP-address>, as defined by the various national and international authorities 🌍

<NSAP-address> lists the actual octet values that the assigning authority gave out 🎟️ In master files, its format is a <character-string>, which is syntactically identical to the one used in TXT and HINFO ✨

The format of NSAP is class insensitive. The NSAP RR causes no additional section processing 🙈

Here's an example:

foo.bar.com.    IN  NSAP   21 47000580ffff000000321099991111222233334444
host.school.de  IN  NSAP   17 39276f3100111100002222333344449876

The RR data is the ASCII representation of the digits 🔢 It's encoded as two <character-strings>, so a count followed by characters 💖

---

The NSAP-PTR RR 🦋

The NSAP-PTR RR uses the mnemonic NSAP-PTR and type code 23 (decimal) 🎀

Its job is analogous to the PTR record used for IP addresses [4,7] 🧚

The NSAP-PTR format looks like this:

<NSAP-suffix> <ttl> <class> NSAP-PTR <owner>

All fields are required. 💅

<NSAP-suffix> lists the actual octet values that the assigning authority gave out for the LOCAL network 🏠 In master files, its format is a <character-string>, which is syntactically identical to the one used in TXT and HINFO 🌈

The format of NSAP-PTR is class insensitive. The NSAP-PTR RR causes no additional section processing 🫶

For example, in net ff08000574.nsap-in-addr.arpa:

444433332222111199990123000000ff    NSAP-PTR   foo.bar.com.

Or, in net 11110031f67293.nsap-in-addr.arpa:

67894444333322220000  NSAP-PTR        host.school.de.

The RR data is the ASCII representation of the digits 🔢 It's encoded as a <character-string> 💜

---

REFERENCES and BIBLIOGRAPHY 📚

[1] Stahl, M., "Domain Administrators Guide", RFC 1032, Network
    Information Center, SRI International, November 1987.

[2] Lottor, M., "Domain Administrators Operations Guide", RFC 1033,
    Network Information Center, SRI International, November, 1987.

[3] Mockapetris, P., "Domain Names - Concepts and Facilities", RFC
    1034, USC/Information Sciences Institute, November 1987.

[4] Mockapetris, P., "Domain Names - Implementation and
    Specification", RFC 1035, USC/Information Sciences Institute,
    November 1987.

[5] Colella, R., Gardner, E., and R. Callon, "Guidelines for OSI
    NSAP Allocation in the Internet", RFC 1237, NIST, Mitre, DEC,
    July 1991.

[6] Callon, R., "TCP and UDP with Bigger Addresses (TUBA),
    A Simple Proposal for Internet Addressing and Routing",
    Digital Equipment Corporation, RFC 1347, June 1992.

[7] Mockapetris, P., "DNS Encoding of Network Names and Other Types",
    RFC 1101, USC/Information Sciences Institute, April 1989.

[8] ISO/IEC.  Information Processing Systems -- Data Communications
    -- Network Service Definition Addendum 2: Network Layer Address-
    ing. International Standard 8348/Addendum 2, ISO/IEC JTC 1,
    Switzerland, 1988.

[9] Bryant, P., "NSAPs", PB660, IPTAG/92/23, SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING
    RESEARCH COUNCIL, RUTHERFORD APPLETON LABORATORY May 1992.

---

Security Considerations 💀

Security issues are not addressed in this memo. 🙈

Author's Address 💌

Bill Manning
Rice University - ONCS
PO Box 1892
6100 South Main
Houston, Texas  77251-1892

Phone: +1.713.285.5415
EMail: bmanning@rice.edu