The following are naming recommendations that apply to most objects registered in global or local directory services.
Object names should contain only the following characters:
· A-Z, a-z
· 0-9
· dash (-)
· underscore (_)
· comma (,)
· period (.)
This list encompasses the characters supported by CDS, DNS, and X.500 global directory services(see the OSF DCE Administration Guide - Core Components for details about additional characters supported by particular directories):
· Case Sensitivity - CDS considers uppercase and lowercase when matching names, while DNS does not. Case for X.500 attributes depends on the syntax registered for a given attribute. Note that the period (.) is considered a separator by DNS and should not be used inside any name to be registered in DNS.
· Length of Names - Any component of a name should contain fewer than 24 characters although CDS supports a maximum length of 255 characters for a simple name (the string between two slashes or the last string in a CDS name) and DNS allows a maximum of 64 characters in a full name (the complete specification of a name, consisting of several simple names). A full name can become unwieldy if each name component is too long.
· Conflict Resolution - The cell administrator responsible for the directory in which the name conflict occurs must decide how to resolve the conflict. In some cases, this may be the user of another management utility that enters names into the namespace (for example, a user registration facility). Some general rules are:
¾ When naming objects initially, consider what would have to be done if there were another of the same object to name.
¾ If the directory location is not fixed by the object class, see if it can be named in a different directory.