Re: [homenet] Support for RFC 7084 on shipping devices...

[Ted Lemon <[e-mail]>]

On Oct 4, 2019, at 5:10 AM, Ole Troan <[e-mail]> wrote:
> Homenet has solved the problem of self-configuring networks in arbitrary topologies.

If that were true, I wouldn’t be asking this question.  We’re still chugging along, but we don’t have something that nay router vender could even consider shipping right now.  There isn’t enough participation in homenet anymore for us to really iron out the kinks.  Certainly if I could count o homenet being present in routers in the home, we wouldn’t be having this conversation! :)

> Unless someone goes to lengths describing exactly how this is supposed to work, the idea of "simplifying" the homenet solution sounds like a recipe for failure.

I tend to agree, but wasn’t proposing that.   I was really just trying to solve the very specific problem of how I do IPv6 routing in the case I described, given the hardware that is likely to be present in the home.

> How are you going to tell the customers that you can only plug in devices in particular topologies and in particular ways.

The customer already has a router.   Suppose I want to add a router with a bunch of devices behind it, and  I know the router I’m adding will never have a second layer behind it.   Can I get it to work?   That’s the problem.

> - single router and bridging (7084)

If it doesn’t filter RA, and I control the second router, I’m okay, right?

> - arbitrary topology plug and play (homenet)

Yes, that’s homenet.   It would really help if folks who think homenet is done would try to deploy it in their home using OpenWRT and see how it goes.   Seriously.   This is not a solved problem.   We’re maybe 50-60% of the way there at this point.   I’ve been trying to make progress on this ever since HNCP was declared done, and occasionally get collaboration, and indeed we may be begining to make progress agan, but we could definitely use more participation if there are folks in 6man who want this to work and imagine that it already does.

> - manually configured (meaning ansible, scripts or whatever automation solution external to the routers themselves).

Yech.   That’s not an option.  :]