Re: [Last-Call] Last Call: <draft-ietf-opsawg-l3sm-l3nm-10.txt> (A Layer 3 VPN Network YANG Model) to Proposed Standard

[tom petch <[e-mail]>]

On 16/07/2021 17:05, The IESG wrote:
>
> The IESG has received a request from the Operations and Management Area
> Working Group WG (opsawg) to consider the following document: - 'A Layer 3
> VPN Network YANG Model'
>    <draft-ietf-opsawg-l3sm-l3nm-10.txt> as Proposed Standard
>
> The IESG plans to make a decision in the next few weeks, and solicits final
> comments on this action. Please send substantive comments to the
> [e-mail] mailing lists by 2021-08-06. Exceptionally, comments may
> be sent to [e-mail] instead. In either case, please retain the beginning
> of the Subject line to allow automated sorting.

This I-D includes a YANG module which provides configuration for
BGP, OSPF, IS-IS, PIM, IGMP, VRRP, RIP, BFD, MLD, NTP, DHCP and such 
like and, as such,
overlaps substantially with existing RFC and I-D.  It does not build on
that work, rather it takes a different direction, which seems likely to
induce misunderstandings.  At WG LC, the shepherd suggested that with so 
much coverage of VPN, then IETF LC should be flagged to the BESS WG so 
that they could review it; I see no sign of that having happened.  By 
the same token, I think that that suggestion could apply to several 
other WG.  Thus the coverage of BGP here seems at variance with much if 
not most of bgp-model.

There is often a need in YANG to differentiate between this version, 
that version or both, which is modelled as a base YANG identity from 
which more specific ones are derived, using YANG's function
'derived-from-or-self' when a combination is wanted. Not here.  Here
there are three identity for e.g. ipv4; one for ipv4 alone, one for ipv6
alone and 'dualstack' for when both versions are present.  Thus 'ipv6' 
has a different meaning to any other YANG module I know, meaning
'ipv6-without-ipv4', and a test for ipv6 becomes
     when "../address-family = 'vpn-common:ipv6' or "
               + "'vpn-common:dual-stack'" {
while a test for ipv4 is
     when "../protocol-type = 'host' and "
              + "../address-family = 'vpn-common:ipv4' or "
              + "'vpn-common:dual-stack'";

The concept of dualstack will be familiar to those implementing hosts 
with IPv6 support but is not something I have ever seen elsewhere and 
may be unfamiliar to most, at least with this meaning as opposed to 
support of other related protocols perhaps outside ther remit of the IETF.

Likewise, this use of address family, with different semantics, is 
inconsistent with its use in such as BGP and RFC8349 (inter alia). 
Unwise IMHO.

I see this use of dualstack and address family as major flaws, show 
stoppers.

For OSPF, other documents derive ospfv2 and ospfv3 from a base ospf
identity and use that to specify ospfv2 or ospfv3, the natural way to 
model the OSPF protocols; here, OSPF is differentiated by 
'address-family' i.e. by ipv4 or ipv6 or dualstack, not something I have 
ever seen with OSPF. What does it mean to activate IPv4, as specified 
here?  OSPFv2 or OPSFv3 or both? If OSPFv3 is used to convey a  IPv4 
prefix, is that ospf/ipv4 or ospf/ipv6 or ospf/dualstack?   The security 
options, in 'container keying-material' are at variance with those in
draft-ietf-ospf-yang in 'container authentication', similar but
different.  Therein, 'case ipsec' is OPSFv3 only but there is no way to 
specify that here with its concept of an OSPF address family.

The I-D defines a type for 'area-address' but this is not the one used 
by OSPF protocols.

RIP, likewise, is diffentiated by address-family rather than by version.
'leaf flush-interval' here defaults to 180, which is invalid as it is
not greater than the 'invalid-interval'; it is 240 in RFC8695.

With BGP it seems more accurate to say that most objects here differ 
from their potential equivalents in bgp-yang, either in identifier, in 
description or in semantics. BGP, RFC4271, defines holdtime and 
keepalive - not here, where it is
hold-time (with different semantics to RFC4271) and keepalive while 
'address-family' has a narrower meaning
than would be expected for BGP.  There appears to be no way to configure
the BGP identifier (for me, the first step).  The local address does not
allow configuration of the port. 'neighbor' configuration does not allow
for identifier or port.  Here 'multihop' is configured as
     leaf multihop {
       type uint8;
          description
            "Describes the number of IP hops allowed
            between a given BGP neighbor and the PE.";
where draft-idr-bgp model has
    leaf multihop-ttl {
       type uint8;
          description
               "Time-to-live value to use when packets are sent to the
                 referenced group or neighbors and ebgp-multihop is
enabled";
which I find clearer.

The limit on prefixes here is specified in container bgp-max-prefix as
"It allows to control how many prefixes can be received from a
neighbor."
while draft-idr-bgp-model has
"Maximum number of prefixes that will be accepted from the neighbour"
which I find more precise. The point where the limit is applied matters; 
currently, there is a discussion in the IDR WG about specifying two 
different limits, one for inbound and one for outbound, a change which 
seems likely to be needed.

More significantly, here restart-interval is
    leaf restart-interval {
      type uint16;
       units "minutes";
while bgp-model has
          leaf restart-timer {
            type uint32;
            units "seconds";
a difference in scale. Here the action is
     leaf warning-threshold
         type decimal64 {
            fraction-digits 5;
              range "0..100";    }
                           units "percent";
whereas the bgp model has
          leaf shutdown-threshold-pct {
            type rt-types:percentage;
a difference in approach

leaf prepend-global-as
controls the prepend of a second AS, the one for the node in addition to 
the one for VPN network access level.

bgp-model has
       container set-as-path-prepend {
         description "Action to prepend local AS number to the AS-path a
            specified number of times";
which is, well, different.

Here the specification of the holdtime only caters for its value once 
the session is established; as RFC4271 says, it may be set to a larger 
value during session establishment

Compared to bgp-model there is an additional security option,
      case explicit {
which I do not understand but would appear to have a key of type string
which sounds like an unmentioned security vulnerability.

Away from BGP, 'router-id' is imported from 'module ietf-routing-types' 
with the appropriate semantics and there is a definition of router-id as 
a 32 bit number in s.7.5 but then a second router-id leaf is created 
with the wrong semantics.  The need for a second concept, an addressible 
one (which 'router-id' is not), has arisen before and 
draft-ietf-ospf-yang defines such an object and gave it a different 
name, 'te-rid', TE being one, but not the only, use thereof. Different 
semantics call for a different name; that name seems suitable for all 
uses if that is what is wanted here. (The I S I S
yang module uses te-rid as well as ipv4-router-id,  ipv6-router-id).

When a range is specified, in YANG, which may be a single address, that 
case is commonly modeled by specifying 'start' = 'end'.  Here it is 
modelled with only the start-address with the presence of the 
end-address implying a range but with no YANG constraint on the value of 
end-address vis-a-vis start address; that seems unnecessarily flexible.


MD5 is part of the security options but is not mentioned in the Security
Considerations; for the NTP yang data model, it was flagged as
deprecated while the TLS WG is seeking to eliminate its use.

Other minor comments

   typedef area-address {
...
     description       "This type defines the area address format.";
Well, worth adding this is not for OSPF

Where 'start' and 'end' are specified, it is customary to impose a YANG
constraint of 'start>end' or 'start>=end'

         leaf dr-priority {
...
                                      Numerically larger DR priority
allows
              a node to be elected as a DR.";
Well, any value allows election; perhaps, as draft-ietf-pim-yang, puts
it
"A larger value has a higher priority over a smaller value.";

         leaf update-interval {
...
       "Indicates the RIP update time.
        That is, the amount of time for which routing updates are sent.";
Perhaps
"Interval at which RIPv2 or RIPng updates are sent.";
as per rtgwg-yang-rip

                     leaf signalling-type {
                         enum ldp {
...
                              In this
                              case, an IGP routing protocol must
                              also be activated.";
Probably 'MUST' and likewise for 'enum bgp'

                 container service {
                   leaf mtu {
...
                                      If CsC is enabled,
                        the requested MTU will refer
                        to the MPLS MTU and not to the IP MTU.";
MPLS does not really do MTU; mpls-base-yang uses 'leaf
maximum-labeled-packet' after a discussion about this issue.


CsC should appear in terminology.

Tom Petch