Re: [babel] Buenos Aires: Babel BoF or WG creation?

[Juliusz Chroboczek <[e-mail]>]

> To me, there are two large open questions. The first is what is the
> applicability or need and work to be done.

That's two questions :-)

I agree that I'll need to write a proper applicability document.  Last
time I tried, I ended up with

  https://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-chroboczek-babel-doesnt-care

which a number of people found entertaining but perhaps overly flippant.
I have good hope that Section 1.1 of this document could serve as the
basis for a formal (and boring) applicability statement.

> While those in the mesh-networking world may have a very clear idea of
> why OSPF, ISIS, RIP, etc. don't work, clearly describing the
> requirements and applicability is necessary.

Right.  Please see Sections 3.2 and 3.3 of the Doesn't Care draft, and let
me know if that's a suitable basis.

> The second open question is whether there is a community that is willing
> and able to do the work.

Yes, there is, although as you guessed many of us cannot afford the time
and expense of going to IETF meetings.  We are quite used to working over
mailing lists.

> Personally, I do not see the goal as a distance-vector IGP Working Group.
> It could be interesting to consider if there are features from other
> protocols that might be needed in Babel for particular use-cases - but
> that is very different.

I'm going to fight tooth and nail against extending the core protocol --
any extensions should go into protocol extensions.  On the other hand,
I think the extension mechanism could be made more powerful.

> Beauty competitions among technologies are rarely pretty or useful.

Very well put.

Thanks for your input,

-- Juliusz