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Conference forty2::mailbus_400

Title:MAILBUS 400 User Forum
Notice:kits 100-109 - Infocenter //www.digital.com/info/messaging
Moderator:IOSG::MARSHALL
Created:Thu Jun 11 1992
Last Modified:Fri Jun 06 1997
Last Successful Update:Fri Jun 06 1997
Number of topics:3210
Total number of notes:9174

3133.0. "Aliases/redirects on partial OR addresses" by SIOG::16.60.80.115::dub03.dbo.dec.com::McCorry (Tenors get women by the score) Fri Feb 14 1997 02:52

Hi

Can aliases (or redirects for that matter) operate on partial OR 
addresses?

For example, I've got a customer site where they have many thousands of 
users served off an old MS Mail gateway, which we're replacing with the 
Exchange X.400 Connector.

They have a routing instruction on a partial OR address which routes 
messages to the gateway, thus:

	C=US;A=ADMD;P=ASSEMBLY.CA.GOV;O=ASSEMBLY

	--> routes to the OLD gateway

but when they implement this new gateway they'll set up routing 
information, thus:

	C=US;A=ADMD;P=CA.GOV;O=ASSEMBLY

	--> routes to the NEW gateway

We'll propagate out new address for all of the users via the directory 
synch process.

However, in the event that people send messages to the old style of 
addresses (with ASSEMBLY.CA.GOV, instead of CA.GOV) (perhaps from PABs or 
replies to old messages), we want to intercept the old address and send 
the message to the new address.

Effectively this would be a term substitution (like rewrite rules in 
sendmail), replacing ASSEMBLY.CA.GOV with CA.GOV.

I know that I could set up redirects or aliases for *each and every* OR 
address, but I just want to set it up on the partial stem, since all of 
the rest will be common.

So if I set up an alias for the old address stem to point to the new 
address stem, will that effectively substitute the term?

I realise that the above example uses the PRMD term, but whatever solution 
we implement here we'd probably have to do for lower order terms as well.

Otherwise it's back to the dir synch to build thousands of aliases or 
redirects.  And while we're on the subject; if I end up having to do it on 
every address, what's the difference between using an alias for it or 
using a recipient redirect?

Any help appreciated.

Kieran

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3133.1Well, it is Friday afternoonZUR01::ASHGGrahame Ash @RLEFri Feb 14 1997 18:305
Probably a daft question . . . do you need to do the "rewriting"? What happens 
if you just change the Routing instruction on the old address to point to the 
new gateway?

grahame
3133.2'Fraid Not!SIOG::ras9.wro.dec.com::dub03.dbo.dec.com::McCorryTenors get women by the scoreSat Feb 15 1997 03:0129
That would be nice...

We only use routing instructions on 3 or 4 partial OR addresses. Each OR 
address stem relates to a particular MS Mail PO.

The X.500 backbone consists of a number of MTAs one in P=ASSEMBLY.CA.GOV 
and another in P=CA.GOV.

The new X.400 connector will be connected into the CA.GOV domain, but a 
routing instruction in this domain routes anything for ASSEMBLY.CA.GOV 
over to the other MTA, so we can't just arbitrarily change the routing.  
The new addresses for the users will have P=CA.GOV anyway, and not 
ASSEMBLY.CA.GOV, so the address would need to be modified en route.

Plus we want to retain the old address for consistency for a preiod of 
time to be valid for connections to the other MTA.

It's real complicated (as you can tell from my feeble attempt to explain 
it.)

I've found the answer to my original question anyway.  It does work for 
partial addresses (thus effectively doing in-line term substitution).

I'm now trying to be more creative with the aliases/rewrites!

K



3133.3More alias woes!SIOG::ras8.wro.dec.com::dub03.dbo.dec.com::McCorryTenors get women by the scoreTue Feb 18 1997 02:2245
Hmmm.  I've got a couple of more questions about the way aliases work.  
I've actually got this all working properly now, but there are a few 
questions that I'd like to field. 

Maybe they're answered in the docs, but I don't have access to them all 
right now, so I'll apologize in advance!


1. It seems that the OR address entry for the alias target must be 
fully and explicitly created in the MTS directory.  For example, if I was 
aliasing:

	C=US;A=ADMD;P=ASSEMBLY.CA.GOV;O=ASSEMBLY;OU1=ASMMS1;OU2=PO5
to
	C=US;A=ADMD;P=CA.GOV;O=ASSEMBLY;OU1=ASMMS1;OU2=PO5

then I must have previously CREATEd the OR address for the alias target, 
not even just part of the stem?  Is this necessary?  If no such fully 
qualified address has previously been defined, then MAILbus 400 NDNs with 
'no routing information'.

2. Partial address routing doesn't seem to operate on the alias target OR 
address.  In the example above, I have to define the routing instruction 
on the *full* address: a routing instruction on OU1 for example doesn't 
seem to work.  It appears that the right-to-left traversal for OR address 
matching isn't implemented when the address is a translated alias.  Is 
this as expected?  Also, if there is no routing information defined on the 
full alias target, but the full OR address is defined (as specified in 1 
above), then MAILbus 400 reverts to the unaliased address in order to find 
a routing instruction.  Is this expected behaviour as well?

3. And finally, when the routing instruction has been found for the alias 
target and the message begins to hurtle its merry way to its intended 
recipient, the OR address of the recipient in the message is actually the 
unaliased and original address, not the aliased form (I captured this 
with an archive).  So no actual "replacement" of addresses takes place, 
just a temporary alias during routing.  Is this correct too?

Like I said, I've got it all working given the above scenarios, I'm just 
confused as to why some of these things happen.

Any comments appreciated.

Kieran 

3133.5ZUR01::ASHGGrahame Ash @RLETue Feb 18 1997 17:2922
Hi Kieran,

I suspect you'll only get a definitive answer to your questions from someone 
with access to the code. But my understanding of an alias is that it's just 
"another name for the same thing." 

My guess would be that the MTA has your address to look up. It does so, 
discovers it's an alias, and follows the link. It doesn't find the info there, 
so it reverts to its address. I don't think it should be assumed that because 
there's an alias at this point, that the higher entries can also be 
equivalent. So it will (should?) start removing terms from the address on the 
msg.

btw, the book (Planning) seems to hint very heavily that your redirection 
strategy shouldn't work. It says Recipient Redirection (what you're trying to 
achieve) should only be placed on full o/r addresses, and MD Redirection 
(which is not what you want) is what goes on partial o/r entries.

So, see the first sentence above!

grahame

3133.6Strange...SIOG::ras10.wro.dec.com::dub03.dbo.dec.com::McCorryTenors get women by the scoreWed Feb 19 1997 19:5910
Thanks Graham

Hmmm, I'm intrigued to find out if it shouldn't work the way that it 
does.  It's certainly solving my problems at the moment, but I'd like 
to be doing it right, instead of exploiting some anomaly.

So, any takers then from Engineering?

K