A process can find out which host system it is running on by interrogating its own HOSTNAME task attribute. This feature makes it possible to write a single program that will take different actions when it is run on different systems.

A process can interrogate its remote ancestry by inspecting the ITINERARY task attribute. This task attribute stores the hostnames of the host systems where each of the ancestors of the process is running. This task attribute can be useful for cases where the process needs to transmit information back to the user and thus needs to know where the user is located.