[IPv6]Re: Adoption call for draft-bonica-6man-deprecate-router-alert

[Ole Troan <[e-mail]>]

The skeptic in me found at least four objections.

- optics. Router Alert is used as part of MLD by every IPv6 implementation on the planet. I’m skeptical about the message the IETF gives by deprecating one of the fundamental building blocks of IPv6. Even if this draft doesn’t have any consequence for implementation. It just looks awkward.

- problem. How many new uses of Router Alert has appeared over the years? Is this a “problem” worth solving?

- implementation. Isn’t the cat already out of the bag? Every IPv6 implementation must handle router alert and must have control plane policing / throttling in place. This draft isn’t changing that.

- new work. What if there is a new protocol requiring a punt out of the forwarding path by an intermediate router? Isn’t HBH + Router Alert the easiest and most performant way for the forwarding plane to do that? Alternatively we’ll end up with magic cookies like STUN (0x2112A442). Where the forwarding plane would have to parse the EH chain before looking at a cookie. 


Cheers,
Ole


> On 11 Jun 2024, at 01:23, Jen Linkova <[e-mail]> wrote:
> 
> This email starts 6MAN adoption call for the following document:
> 
> Title : Deprecation Of The IPv6 Router Alert Option
> Authors : Ron Bonica
> Date : 2024-02-19
> 
> https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-bonica-6man-deprecate-router-alert/
> 
> Substantive comments, statements of support for adopting this
> document or objections to the adoption should be sent to the mailing
> list.  Editorial suggestions can be sent to the authors.
> .
> This adoption call will end on June 26th 2024.
> 
> Regards,
> Jen Linkova on behalf of 6MAN chairs.
> 
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