RFC 1564 (rfc1564) - Page 2 of 21

DSA Metrics (OSI-DS 34 (v3))

RFC 1564                      DSA Metrics                   January 1994


   7.   Management tools                                             11
        7.1    Dynamic system management  .....................      11
        7.2    Static system management  ......................      12
        7.3    Data management.................................      12
   8.   Operational Use                                              12
   9.   Interoperability                                             12
   10.  Performance                                                  13
        10.1   Speed for various operations  ..................      14
            10.1.1   Bind .....................................      14
            10.1.2   List .....................................      15
            10.1.3   Search  ..................................      15
            10.1.4   Read .....................................      16
            10.1.5   Add entry.................................      16
            10.1.6   Modify entry .............................      16
            10.1.7   Modify RDN  ..............................      16
            10.1.8   Query rate  ..............................      17
        10.2   The results.....................................      17
        10.3   Environment used for benchmarking  .............      17
   11. Security Considerations                                       21
   12. Authors' Addresses                                            21

1.  Overview

   The purpose of this document is to define some metrics by which DSA
   products can be measured.  Such metrics are valuable as whilst an
   X.500 DSA must conform to the specification in the standard - this is
   a sine qua non - protocol conformance is not in itself the hallmark
   of a usable implementation.  A DSA must perform operations within a
   reasonable time; a DSA must offer good throughput of queries; a DSA
   must be able to handle a reasonable volume of data; if modification
   operations are provided, some sort of access control must be
   provided; a DSA and its data must be manageable.

   In many respects, it is almost impossible to say that one DSA is
   better than other from looking at the responses to questions in this
   document.  For some, the cost or level of support will be the key
   criterion.  For another user, the flexibility of the schema
   management facilities, or the feasibility of running the DSA over an
   existing relational database, will be of prime importance.  In many
   respects DSAs will just be different, rather than better or worse.
   However, all other things being equal, the look-up speed of a DSA is
   very obviously measurable, and there is a substantial number of
   questions on the speed of the various X.500 operations, and in
   particular on the look-up operations.

   Throughout this document, some of the questions posed are annotated
   with a square-bracketed points score and an explanation as to how the
   points should be allocated.  For example, a question might be



Barker & Hedberg