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Re: Terminology

Erik Nordmark wrote:

We clearly need two different words for two different actions:

  1. Handing over an "identifier" from one end-point to another,
     with the intention of the receiving end-point being able to
     contact the "identified" end-point in the future.

  2. Handing over an end of an (active) association from one
     end-point to another.

I was using the term "referral" in the first sense, while you
seem to be using in the second sense.

FWIW I've been thinking of #2 as "rehoming" while calling #1 "referral". 

Oh well.  English seems to be hard language.  I think that we
have at least three different scenarios here.

 1)  Node A has an A-B session with node B.  A sends an identifier
     of node C over the A-B session, allowing B to start a new
     session with C.

     This is what I originally thought that referral means.  This
     is what seems to happen in FTP when you use a PORT command
     that refers to a third host.

 2)  Node A has an A-B session with node B.  A starts a new A-C
     session with node C, and hands over its (A's) end of the
     active A-B session to C, so that the A-B session now becomes
     a C-B session, allowing B and C can communicate directly.
     A is no more involved in communication.

     According to my poor understanding this is what Dave meant
     with referral, but I am probably wrong.  Erik seems to call
     this rehoming.  I don't have a name for this, since I have
     never seen this in real life.

 3)  Node A has a session with node B.  A sends one of its own,
     application level identifiers, say A_app, and the corresponding
     "identity" to node B, allowing node B to appear as A_app in the
     future.

     I would call this rehoming, since now the (application level)
     entity Aapp that was earlier located at node A is now located
     at node B.

--Pekka Nikander