Re: ASN draft

[Bill Manning <[e-mail]>]

> You've got Jon in your pocket.  Define a new number space. We've already taken
> yours. :-)

Wrong.  Jon holds the strings that make me dance. :)  And besides, we have
defined a new number space, we just need folks to use it.  (Guess.  Nope,
Guess again.  Your right... RDI's!)

> But seriously, I think you're in the Merrit trap.  This home AS stuff is
> a bunch of BS.  There's nothing really (right now) that says that I can't
> advertise my nets with multiple first ASs in the path... heck, the "P"
> service provider and the "N" service provider have been doing that for
> years.
> 
> Why should a prefix be tied to an AS?  That's just the way Merrit organized
> things,  but I think that was one honking mistake, looking back on it now.
> 

Visions of Haley Mills as lord high routing wizzard are dancing before my
tired eyes.  Very Scary.   
I don't think this is a Merit/PRDB thing.  I got this home-as stuff from the
RIPE stuff.

To me, the AS defines an administrative bound. One that can request delegations
of address space.  One those delegations are made, then there can be a mapping
of route announcements.  But there does not have to be.  In that case the 
prefix delegation to AS map acts as an indicator of potential for new routes.
In a routing registry and in Rwhois, the ASN is the tag used to identify
the scope of the administrative bound.

Once the choice is made to annouce a prefix, then one or more ASNs need to be
applied to create routing policy. However, one AS has been delegated the prefix
in question and has the right of first refusal.

If I have been delegated 192.0.2.0/24  and am in AS 2886, then even though
I share an IGP with LosNettos, who shares an IGP with CERFnet who BGP peers
with others and aggregates my prefix into the CERFnet ASN for announcement to
the world, I have the right to change to way 192.0.2.0 is announced... yes?
If I turn off all my hosts, then just because LN or CERFnet is accepting 
announcements for the shorter prefix does not imply reachability.
As duely delegated maintainer of the 192.0.2.0/24 space, I can then move
it to, say MCI and ask MCI to announce this prefix for me under their ASN.
I still have not given up my delegation and my ASN is intact.  When I decide
that I really need redundent connectivity, I'll have to coordinate w/ folks
to start using my ASN instead of theirs.

--bill