Resolving server names to network addresses in NRPC

Communications between Notes® and Domino® occur through the NRPC protocol running on the supported LAN protocol. When a Notes® workstation or Domino® server attempts to connect to a Domino® server on the LAN, it uses a combination of the built-in Notes® Name Service and the network protocol's name-resolver service to convert the name of the Domino® server to a physical address on the network.

About this task

The Notes® Name Service resolves Domino® common names to their respective protocol-specific names. Because the Notes® Name Service resolves common names by making calls to the Domino® Directory, the service becomes available to the Notes® workstation only after the workstation has successfully connected to its home (messaging) server for the first time. (The protocol name-resolver service normally makes the first connection possible.) When the Notes® workstation makes a subsequent attempt to connect to a Domino® server, the Notes® Name Service supplies it with the Domino® server's protocol-specific name -- that is, the name that the server is known by in the protocol's name service -- which is stored in the protocol's Net Address field in the Server document. The protocol's name-resolver service then resolves the protocol-specific name to its protocol-specific address, and the workstation is able to connect to the server.

Note: When resolving names of Domino® servers that offer Internet services, Notes® uses the protocol's name-resolver service directly.

How name resolution works in NRPC

About this task

A Notes® workstation or Domino® server follows these steps to resolve the name of the Domino® server to which it is trying to connect over NRPC.

Note: If the Net Address field in the Server document contains a physical address -- a practice that is not recommended in a production environment-- the Notes® Name Service performs the resolve directly, thus placing the burden of maintaining physical address changes on the Domino® administrator.

Procedure

  1. If the workstation/server has a Connection document for the destination server that contains the protocol-specific name, the workstation/server passes the protocol-specific name to the protocol's name-resolver service. If the Connection document contains a physical address, the Notes® Name Service performs the resolve directly. Normal-priority Connection documents are checked first, and then low-priority Connection documents.
    Note: Unlike in Server documents, adding physical addresses in Connection documents is not discouraged, since only the local workstation/server uses the Connection document.
  2. To determine if the destination server's protocol-specific name is cached, the workstation checks the Location document and the server checks its own Server document. If the name is cached, the workstation/server uses the last-used Notes® network port to determine the protocol and passes this value to the protocol's name-resolver service.
  3. If the protocol-specific name is not cached, one of the following occurs, based on the list order of enabled Notes® network ports:
    • For a Notes® workstation connected to the home (messaging) server, Notes® gives the common name of the destination Domino® server to the home server, which looks in the Domino® Directory for the Server document of the destination server. The home server locates the contents of the Net Address field for the Notes® named network that the Notes® workstation has in common with the destination server and passes this name to the protocol's name-resolver service. If the workstation and the destination server are in the same Domino® domain but not in the same Notes® named network, the home server locates the names of each protocol that the workstation has in common with the destination server and passes each to the appropriate protocol until a resolve is made. If the Notes® workstation can't access its home server, it connects to its secondary Notes® name server, which carries out the same actions as the home server.
    • For a Domino® server, Domino® checks the Server document for the destination server, locates the contents of the Net Address field for the Notes® named network that the Domino® server has in common with the destination server, and passes this name to the protocol's name-resolver service. If the destination server is in the same Domino® domain as the Domino® server, but not in the same Notes® named network, the Domino® server locates the protocol name of each protocol that it has in common with the destination server and passes each to the appropriate protocol until a resolve is made.
  4. If Steps 1 through 3 do not produce the server's network address, the workstation/server offers the Domino® common name of the destination server to the name-resolver service of each protocol, based on the order of the enabled network ports in the Server document.