4 ms·

If it's useful data that's being stored and retrieved, I'd argue it's better for the internet as a whole. It shifts load from webservers (where people are downl

If it's useful data that's being stored and retrieved, I'd argue it's better for the internet as a whole. It shifts load from webservers (where people are downloading 5mb of page data just to find a phone number) to DNS, which is far more efficient. If NUM is success it will certainly increase load but I don't think it would be an unnecessary load, since it would be serving a worthwhile purpose.

tedk-42 5y ago
It's not better for the internet as a whole. Host your own data behind a CDN and S3. There are also lots of free services (github pages netlify) which allow you to store static content. Use these over a DNS server to store your data.
- elliottinvent 5y ago
  I appreciate your feedback and am interested by your point of view on this. > It's not better for the internet as a whole. We've built this because we believe if all the people manually trawling websites looking for particular pieces of data were instead fetching this data automatically through ultra-efficient DNS queries, it would be better for the internet as a whole. > Host your own data behind a CDN and S3. We could certainly do this, we've made this a DNS-based protocol so domain owners can adopt it independently in their own DNS.
  - belthesar 5y ago
    Have you considered that part of the reason why DNS is ultra efficient is that it's a relatively constrained dataset of small but meaningful data objects? I worry for all of the places running caching DNS proxies suddenly tanking their query resolver performance because their caches are flushing far more rapidly, and root hint servers seeing a massive influx of data now being stored in the platform. The technical marvel is cool, but I sincerely worry about this becoming a widely used product.
    - elliottinvent 5y ago
      > Have you considered that part of the reason why DNS is ultra efficient is that it's a relatively constrained dataset of small but meaningful data objects? I’m not sure it is. The size of DNSSEC responses are not insignificant. The apex for many domains is polluted with utter garbage: dig target.com TXT The DNS is ultra efficient because it’s cached and distributed, yes packet sizes are relatively small but a standard NUM record would be smaller than the original udp packet limit of 512.
potamic 5y ago
Better for the internet as a whole is a pretty big leap of reasoning. There is plenty of useful data in the web that needs to be stored and retrieved. In fact, this is precisely what the web was built for. It is an information network. Why hack the DNS system for this? DNS is meant for domain name discovery. It has a specific purpose. In large architectures, it is almost never a good idea to break such separation of concerns.
- elliottinvent 5y ago
  Thanks for your comment. The DNS is used for a lot more than converting domain to IPs and mail servers, run: dig target.com TXT And be amazed at the pollution at the apex. SPF, DMARC and others show that DNS is already being used for much more. The DNS is a distributed database. The primary key is the domain and we believe that converting human friendly domains to machine readable data shouldn’t stop at IPs, mail servers and anti-spam measures (SPF and DMARC). It should extend to phone numbers, gps coordinates, bank details and more.
  - potamic 5y ago
    That is indeed quite some bloat. I suppose it makes sense for use cases where domain name related metadata is needed across the internet infrastructure (like for email with SPF). Just not sure it's a good idea to extend DNS for data like contact info that is ultimately meant for human consumption. Where do we draw the line otherwise? I could start caching web artefacts in TXT records or even serve entire web pages.
    - elliottinvent 5y ago
      I agree there’s a line where putting data in DNS is just a gimmick (eg storing images in DNS) because the web does it infinitely better. But in the case of contact information I think it makes a lot of sense. This demo site is an intense example because it’s contact info for very large companies. For smaller companies it’s just one DNS TXT record, usually under the original 512b DNS UDP packet limit. I don’t agree that contact information is meant for human consumption. The humans (or often machines) at the end of phone numbers are for humans but the route to get there (eg telephone system) is designed for machines.

tedk-42 5y ago

It's not better for the internet as a whole. Host your own data behind a CDN and S3. There are also lots of free services (github pages netlify) which allow you to store static content. Use these over a DNS server to store your data.

elliottinvent 5y ago
I appreciate your feedback and am interested by your point of view on this. > It's not better for the internet as a whole. We've built this because we believe if all the people manually trawling websites looking for particular pieces of data were instead fetching this data automatically through ultra-efficient DNS queries, it would be better for the internet as a whole. > Host your own data behind a CDN and S3. We could certainly do this, we've made this a DNS-based protocol so domain owners can adopt it independently in their own DNS.
- belthesar 5y ago
  Have you considered that part of the reason why DNS is ultra efficient is that it's a relatively constrained dataset of small but meaningful data objects? I worry for all of the places running caching DNS proxies suddenly tanking their query resolver performance because their caches are flushing far more rapidly, and root hint servers seeing a massive influx of data now being stored in the platform. The technical marvel is cool, but I sincerely worry about this becoming a widely used product.
  - elliottinvent 5y ago
    > Have you considered that part of the reason why DNS is ultra efficient is that it's a relatively constrained dataset of small but meaningful data objects? I’m not sure it is. The size of DNSSEC responses are not insignificant. The apex for many domains is polluted with utter garbage: dig target.com TXT The DNS is ultra efficient because it’s cached and distributed, yes packet sizes are relatively small but a standard NUM record would be smaller than the original udp packet limit of 512.

potamic 5y ago

Better for the internet as a whole is a pretty big leap of reasoning. There is plenty of useful data in the web that needs to be stored and retrieved. In fact, this is precisely what the web was built for. It is an information network. Why hack the DNS system for this? DNS is meant for domain name discovery. It has a specific purpose. In large architectures, it is almost never a good idea to break such separation of concerns.

elliottinvent 5y ago
Thanks for your comment. The DNS is used for a lot more than converting domain to IPs and mail servers, run: dig target.com TXT And be amazed at the pollution at the apex. SPF, DMARC and others show that DNS is already being used for much more. The DNS is a distributed database. The primary key is the domain and we believe that converting human friendly domains to machine readable data shouldn’t stop at IPs, mail servers and anti-spam measures (SPF and DMARC). It should extend to phone numbers, gps coordinates, bank details and more.
- potamic 5y ago
  That is indeed quite some bloat. I suppose it makes sense for use cases where domain name related metadata is needed across the internet infrastructure (like for email with SPF). Just not sure it's a good idea to extend DNS for data like contact info that is ultimately meant for human consumption. Where do we draw the line otherwise? I could start caching web artefacts in TXT records or even serve entire web pages.
  - elliottinvent 5y ago
    I agree there’s a line where putting data in DNS is just a gimmick (eg storing images in DNS) because the web does it infinitely better. But in the case of contact information I think it makes a lot of sense. This demo site is an intense example because it’s contact info for very large companies. For smaller companies it’s just one DNS TXT record, usually under the original 512b DNS UDP packet limit. I don’t agree that contact information is meant for human consumption. The humans (or often machines) at the end of phone numbers are for humans but the route to get there (eg telephone system) is designed for machines.