NSF Developments

[Russ Hobby <[e-mail]>]

Distributed File System Working Group:

Well that have been some recent developements on the NFS front on which
I would like to get your input. First, at the last IETF meeting Steve
Crocker and I met with Jeffery Edelheit <[e-mail]>, a
representative of TSIG, a group that has been working on some security
aspects of various protocols. As it turns out one of their projects is
to work on the security aspects of NFS. They would like to work with
the IETF on standardizing this work, and, of course, that is where this
WG comes in. TSIG is having a meeting in Seattle May 7-9 and has
invited someone that could represent the DFS WG. TSIG has been only
addressing the security aspects, whereas the WG has had concerns on
security and congestion control.  I would like to hear suggestions on
how we can merge the work of the WG and TSIG.

The other item that makes this now possible, is the IAB is working to
define how protocols developed and owned by other can be integrated
into the set of Internet protocols. NFS is a prime target for this kind
of work. Although the rules are not yet concrete, the general idea is
use other's protocol definitions as a base for IETF work.  The IETF
version of the protocol will not try to automaticly follow any further
developement of the other's protocol, but will continue to use the IETF
defined base.  If the owner of the protocol does make further
developement on their protocol, the IETF can update to a new base if it
is found by the IETF to be advantagous.

So it looks like we can now work on an Internet NFS and fix the things 
to make it better for the Internet.


Russ Hobby                              INTERNET: [e-mail]  
IETF Area Director - Applications       BITNET:   RDHOBBY@UCDAVIS  
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