Internet Name Resolution

In order to locate people, web sites, files, etc, a standard is required for naming/addressing locations/people/objects on the Internet, and a mechanism for finding such information.

Several standards has been proposed and used to address this issue. The Domain Name System (DNS) has long been used by the Internet community for locating host sites and email addresses.

Standards, such as the X.500 suite, while large and bulky, provide added flexibility. LDAP is an Internet implementation of X.500 Directory Services features.

The following lists some of the standards involved in name resolution.

Domain Name System (DNS) Concepts/Overview -- RFC 1024
DNS Specification -- RFC 1035
DNS-MX (eMail) -- RFC 0974
Light-weight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) -- RFC 1777