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To: RIT who wrote (34648)	11/4/2000 12:57:30 PM
From: PJ Strifas	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 42771

Here's the thing with personal directories: If I have a copy located on my local drive - I can only access my information while at my PC or while my PC is logged into a network (so I could log into the directory via the internet). So if I'm not using my PC with Personal Directory installed or able to access it from a network connection, the information would be "offline" and unavailable to me. Even with "federation" myDirectory would still need to be accessible to me. What if I'm not at my PC where "myDirectory" is located. There is a way to make copies can carry that around but do you really want to be installing Directory on your friend's PC when you are there visiting? Or do we expect people to accept the limited functionality while you are away from their PC? Or to expect people to add the complexity of constantly-on internet access to their lives (not completely possible is it)? This type of access brings a host of different issues into play...and not to mention costs too. So what would really make Personal Directories more functional would be for me to make a "replica" (a copy) of it on a hosted service. This way, my information would be available at all times. In fact, with filtered replication, I can copy only that information I would NEED to have available at all times (usernames, passwords for sites, my bookmarks, preferences for internet applications etc) while I keep other information securely stored on my local drive. From this centrally hosted "replica", I can then share selected information with just about anyone (banks, merchants, friends & family, etc). Let's take it a step further -- creating applications that would enhance Personal Directory. Well, I for one would love to see a personal ICS-type of service written for individuals. The ability to protect my "home network" as well as introduce caching would be a great benefit. Even better yet, a hosted service I could subscribe to would handle that caching (& VPN service) for me and Personal Directory would merely authenticate me to that service and allow me access to the content I have selected. So I don't really traverse the complete path to the origination server but merely to the content exchange center nearest me :) More applications - how about telephony! How about digitalme integration into pNDS? What about syncing my PDA! (If anyone uses a Palm and Avantgo would instantly see a neat benefit into integrating that type of service). I could go on and on :) But I think I make a good point - there are endless possibilities using Personal Directory as an anchor to a solution (or even a strategy). Now if I could only create Directory Map objects in Personal Directory that pointed to my webfolders.... Regards, Peter J Strifas

To: RIT who wrote (34648)	11/4/2000 7:43:59 PM
From: Scott C. Lemon	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 42771

Hello RIT, > Centralized federation, will be a major part of the > overall picture(B to C and B to B), but the features of > federation will allow for true P to P as well. Im my research and interaction with people building these systems, they start to understand that centralized federation breaks down early on when you want to add extended attributes and information to an object which doesn't exist in your directory ... but instead resides in a federated partition. In these cases, you begin to have to create a "duplicate"object in your directory to store the extended attribute information ... and at this point you might as well just have a duplicate object. Second to this, is the requirement or desire to access the information forever. I'll bet that you can't show me a company that would allow a customer to delete all their information at any time ... something that can occur if the user removes the federation rights. So all of the implementors that I am working with recognize that in a centrally federated architecture they are going to "cache" copies of all objects ... so we are back to having duplicates ... In the end, in all cases that I have discussed specific implementations vs. "bluesky" discussions, the implementors have realized that centralized federation is not going to solve their needs. Sounds great ... but too many side effects. > So you can 'trust' your friends to access your computer > across the net, while your credit card transations are > validated by people like AMEX. We may even get to the > point that AMEX uses details published by your own system. And this is a good example. In my conversations with credit card companies, they are not going to allow the user to "federate" ... they are going to be the owner of the user object ... in their directory. As for users accessing my personal directory, very few people in the world will ever directly access my personal directory. Instead, I will be sharing my information through an intermediary directory. You'll be able to get my identity information through, for example, a Silicon Investor directory ... I'm not interested in giving people access to the machine and directory where all of my personal and confidential information is stored ... just a security perspective. You might feel just fine about it ... ;-) Scott C. Lemon