TRANSFER Programming Manual

The Validation Process
Naming TRANSFER Objects
4–12 069138, Update 1 to 040970 Tandem Computers Incorporated
When a user process supplies one or more names in a request to the TRANSFER
delivery system on behalf of a correspondent. The TRANSFER delivery system
uses the fields within the correspondent’s profile to determine whether the name
is resolved immediately or later. The following rules apply:
If the profile specifies immediate resolution of a recipient or distribution list
member name, the process waits while the TRANSFER delivery system checks
to see that the name exists. If a remote node is required but is inaccessible, a
resolution error occurs.
If the profile specifies deferred resolution of a recipient or distribution list
member name, the TRANSFER delivery system accepts the name without
further processing and resolves it later. In most cases, deferred resolution is
only used for names defined at remote nodes. For remote deferred resolution,
the TRANSFER delivery system still ensures that a supplied name is
syntactically correct when it is entered.
When the TRANSFER delivery system expands a recipient list to deliver a package
to one or more recipients. The TRANSFER delivery system expands local
distribution lists and resolves the names of local and remote members. If a
package has recipients at remote nodes, a copy of the package is transported to
each of those nodes. Distribution lists are expanded at the remote nodes and the
member names are resolved by the TRANSFER processes at those nodes.
The Validation Process The first step of the validation process is name resolution. If a process supplies a
partial name or a nonunique name, the TRANSFER delivery system must be able to
clearly associate the name with an existing object. The TRANSFER delivery system
performs name resolution as follows:
If the name is not fully qualified, the TRANSFER delivery system transforms the
given name into one or more fully qualified names (that is, the complete names of
the correspondent and the network node). To transform the name, the TRANSFER
delivery system performs the following steps:
The TRANSFER delivery system searches the list of objects at the lower level
before it searches the list of objects at the higher level. During this search, an
object name might match entries defined at both levels in the name directory.
For example, a correspondent named ANNIE can have a distribution list
named JOHN while a correspondent named JOHN also exists in the system. If
ANNIE sends a message to JOHN, the distribution list name will be used
because it is the first exact match found.
If a wild-card character (*) occurs in the name, the TRANSFER delivery system
checks to determine if the name is ambiguous. Ambiguity exists if more than
one possible candidate can resolve the name during the search at a particular
level. When ambiguity between names exists at different levels, the candidate
at the lower level is selected. When ambiguity exists at the same level and a
unique entity is required, the TRANSFER delivery system returns an error.
If an @ character is present in the name, the name is fully qualified and the
TRANSFER delivery system skips this step.