Namespace¶

Properties¶

Find below the complete list of configurable properties.

Duration¶

At the time of the namespace registration, you must set the number of confirmed blocks you would like to rent the namespace for.

The public network defines a minimum namespace duration of 30 days and a maximum of 365 days, being these parameters editable per network. By default, the network is configured to generate a block every 15 seconds. You can use the following formula to convert approximately days to blocks:

\[duration ≈ numberOfDays * 86400 / blockGenerationTargetTimeInSeconds\]

Namespace life-cycle

During the renting period, the namespace creator can create subnamespaces, alias accounts and mosaics. The creator can also extend the rental by sending a NamespaceRegistrationTransaction with the desired number of additional blocks.

The network can define a grace period that enables the namespace creator to renew the namespace past the expiration date before it becomes publicly available for registration. Symbol’s public network has set the grace period to 30 days.

When the grace period ends, the namespace is deleted. At this point, the namespace becomes available for its registration again.

Permissions by namespace status¶

Action	Available	Registration Period	Grace Period
Register a new namespace	✔️	❌	❌
Renew the namespace	❌	✔️	✔️
Create subnamespaces	❌	✔️	❌
Link an alias to an address or mosaic	❌	✔️	❌
Send a transaction using an alias	❌	✔️	❌

Note

Only namespaces created during the nemesis block can have perpetual duration.

Subnamespaces¶

On the internet, a domain can have a sub-domain. Symbol namespaces can have subnamespaces to identify and organize assets.

Organizing assets with namespaces

In the public network, namespaces can have up to 3 levels—a namespace and its two levels of subnamespace domains. Each root namespace can have up to 256 subnamespaces.

A subnamespace does not have a duration by its own; it inherits the duration from its parent namespace.

You can create multiple subnamespaces with the same name in different namespaces. For example, you can create the subnamespaces foo.bar and foo2.bar, but the combination rootnamespace + subnamespace must remain unique.

Alias¶

Alias transactions link namespaces to accounts and mosaics. An alias or its linked asset can be used interchangeably when sending a transaction. Using the alias makes long addresses rememberable and mosaics recognizable.

The creator of the namespace can link the namespace to an account or mosaic. This link will be editable, so the creator may unlink a previously set alias and link the namespace to a different asset.

The block receipts store the resolution of the alias for a given transaction.

Alias transactions have the following restrictions:

• An account or mosaic can be linked to many namespaces but one namespace can only be linked to one account or mosaic.
• An account can assign a namespace to any account that permits receiving AddressAliasTransaction.
• An account can only link the alias to a mosaic id when the account is the creator of the mosaic.

Rental fee¶

An account willing to register a namespace or extend its duration has to pay a rental fee in addition to the transaction fee. Both fees will be deducted from the account’s balance after the announcement of a valid NamespaceRegistrationTransaction.

The REST Gateway provides an endpoint to get an estimation of how much network currency will cost you to register a namespace:

    const nodeUrl = 'http://api-01.us-east-1.096x.symboldev.network:3000';
    const repositoryHttp = new RepositoryFactoryHttp(nodeUrl);

    const networkHttp = repositoryHttp.createNetworkRepository();
    networkHttp.getRentalFees().subscribe((rentalFees) => {
        console.log('RootNamespaceRentalFeePerBlock',
        rentalFees.effectiveRootNamespaceRentalFeePerBlock.compact());
        console.log('ChildNamespaceRentalFee',
        rentalFees.effectiveChildNamespaceRentalFee.compact());
    });

    const nodeUrl = 'http://api-01.us-east-1.096x.symboldev.network:3000';
    const repositoryHttp = new symbol_sdk_1.RepositoryFactoryHttp(nodeUrl);
    const networkHttp = repositoryHttp.createNetworkRepository();
    networkHttp.getRentalFees().subscribe((rentalFees) => {
        console.log('RootNamespaceRentalFeePerBlock', rentalFees.effectiveRootNamespaceRentalFeePerBlock.compact());
        console.log('ChildNamespaceRentalFee', rentalFees.effectiveChildNamespaceRentalFee.compact());
    });

The default namespace rental fees are configurable per network, but the network dynamically adjusts the namespace rental fees over time.

To calculate the effective rental fee, the network multiplies the default value set in the configuration by the median network multiplier over last maxDifficultyBlocks. In case there are zero multipliers, these are replaced by the defaultDynamicFeeMultiplier before the median calculation.

Related transactions¶

Guides¶

• Registering a namespace

  Create a unique name to identify your assets.

• Creating a subnamespace

  Once you have a registered root namespace, you can create up to 3 levels of subnamespaces to organize your assets.

• Linking a namespace to a mosaic

  Alias an mosaic with a namespace so that others can reference it in a more friendly way when issuing transactions.

• Linking a namespace to an address

  Alias an address with a namespace so that others can reference the account in a more friendly way when issuing transactions.

• Getting the namespace information

  Get the ownership and duration for a given namespace identifier.

• Extending a namespace registration period

  This guide shows you how to extend the rental period of a namespace.

Continue: Metadata.