> I plan to do some cleanup of the residual code defining and using the > old Internet network classes (A/B/C), which have been obsolete since > CIDR took hold. This is an outline of what I plan, as it will happen > in a number of steps and reviews, and I would like feedback on some > of it. > > I want to reduce the use of the obsolete definitions and interfaces, > and make it less likely for them to be used going forward. I plan > to hide the Class A/B/C bit definitions unless a feature test macro > is defined; that will be the default for user code for the moment. > A few files in the kernel will need to define the feature test macro > for now (but see the next two paragraphs).
Sounds good. > > Several of the uses of the historical network class macros have to > do with generating a default network mask when none is provided. > The worst of these is in the code for SIOCAIFADDR (add interface > address). I want to have ifconfig and/or the kernel warn about this; > the default is most likely wrong. After some time with a warning, > it should become an error to set an Internet interface address > without a mask (except for loopback and point-to-point interfaces, > where the mask is meaningless). Sounds good except that last bit, mask on loopback is meaningful, especially for people like me that alrady have modified systems that change loopback from 127/8 to 127/16. Also care should be taken on point to point, I think there is probably a fair bit of code/systems out there that MAY still assume /30 or require /30 to be set on these, it MAY be an interropt issue to force the FreeBSD end to /32. > > I am tempted to define a new default mask, e.g. 24 bits, for those > places that must be able to generate one. An example is NFS BOOTP > code. I am interested in feedback on this idea. It would help to > reduce use of the old masks, and 8- or 16-bit prefixes are highly > unlikely to be correct. Comments on adding a default mask? This > would eliminate the use of the old class macros in the kernel. I am not keen on the idea of a default mask at all. I believe every place that an IP address -is- used also has the ability to specify a netmask. > > The C library routines inet_netof() and inet_lnaof() should be > deprecated, as they use the historical masks. inet_makeaddr() is > almost as bad; it works almost by accident as long as a mask is a > multiple of 8 bits. I'd like to remove their use from the base > system. Unfortunately, I have no idea how much other software uses > them. We can at least document them as deprecated and unsafe. Wrap them in a depricating macro, the do a EXP-RUN with that macro defined, should get a good idea of that fallout from that. I do believe Linux still defines the CLASS macros. > Mike -- Rod Grimes rgri...@freebsd.org
