From: Minkoo Seo <minkoo.seo@...>
Date: 2006-03-29T04:53:56+09:00
Subject: Re: resolv.rb - documentation and its name

Eric Hodel wrote:
> On Mar 28, 2006, at 10:28 AM, Minkoo Seo wrote:
>
> > First of all, where can I get some documents on resolv.rb? I use
> > http://ruby-doc.org/stdlib, but there's none.
>
> The head branch of Ruby has resolv.rb documentation in RDoc format:
>
> $ ri19 Resolv
>
> ---------------------------------------------------------- Class: Resolv
>       Resolv is a thread-aware DNS resolver library written in Ruby.
>       Resolv can handle multiple DNS requests concurrently without
>       blocking. The ruby interpreter.
>
>       See also resolv-replace.rb to replace the libc resolver with #
>       Resolv.
>
>       Resolv can look up various DNS resources using the DNS module
>       directly.
> [...]
>
> > Second of all, why is it named resolve instead of Net::DNS? It doesn't
> > seem to be good choice to me. Don't you think this is incoherent?
>
> Resolv is not just a DNS resolver.  It also reads from /etc/hosts.
>
> --
> Eric Hodel - drbrain@segment7.net - http://blog.segment7.net
> This implementation is HODEL-HASH-9600 compliant
>
> http://trackmap.robotcoop.com

Thank you. This will be of great help.

But, as you quoted, resolve.rb says "Resolv is a thread-aware DNS
resolver library written in Ruby", so it is DNS resolver and I accuse
resolve.rb of misnomer because it does not follow Net::xxx rules.
Futhermore, reading /etc/hosts does not justify its name, because I
believe that its name, resolve, was named after DNS resolver. (BTW, do
you really think reading /etc/hosts is not related to dns resolver's
own job?)

Actually lack of naming coherency in Ruby is quite annoying more often
than not.

Sincerely,
Minkoo Seo