At the end of the day it doesn't matter what you call it, the fundamental problem is that the widespread assumptions about a single-interface / single-address are not realistic in today's Internet, and there are independent policy realms influencing each end system. The available tool set is built on a single-interface / single-policy-realm model, so it routinely fails. Any effort that does not recognize that there needs to be a way to describe the policy attributes is going to create a short-sighted mess.
Keith is also right, in that aspects of the problem from the application perspective still fail even when there are multiple choices from the same administrative entity. That said, there should be a way to describe the local policy attributes to sort between choices from a common administration. The bottom line is that we need to stop the fantasy that there are -any- global attributes. This alone is the source of most of the confusion, and if removed it would be fairly obvious to most people how to sort between the choices. The IPv6 address selection effort is suffering from the same 'merged global attribute' mindset, and needs to be able to describe policy attributes to each source of addresses, then a hierarchy for sorting through them. I do object to having the charter spend any more time on IPv4 than to simply document current practice as a reference. It is long past time for the IETF to stop wasting cycles on a dead end, and this should be one place where we say 'it just doesn't work in IPv4, so move to IPv6 if you need multiple interfaces'. Other than that I think it is fine. Tony > -----Original Message----- > From: ietf-boun...@ietf.org [mailto:ietf-boun...@ietf.org] On Behalf Of > Melinda Shore > Sent: Tuesday, April 21, 2009 3:09 PM > To: Dean Willis > Cc: IETF Discussion > Subject: Re: [mif] WG Review: Multiple InterFaces (mif) > > Dean Willis wrote: > > Consider that peering policy is often driven by things that are well > > beyond the scope of protocol. Its potential range of expression is > > unlimited; in fact driven by a natural-language contract and > heuristic > > operations on underspecified constraints derived from that > > natural-language contract. > > Good heavens - I was not proposing, nor would I > propose, that what's needed here is the development > of a policy language. If the word "policy" is > making people uncomfortable perhaps it would be > better to drop it in favor of "properties." > > Melinda > _______________________________________________ > Ietf mailing list > Ietf@ietf.org > https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf _______________________________________________ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf