Re: [Netconf] Does NMDA support synchronous configuration operation?

Juergen Schoenwaelder <j.schoenwaelder@jacobs-university.de> Mon, 25 June 2018 19:00 UTC

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Date: Mon, 25 Jun 2018 21:00:14 +0200
From: Juergen Schoenwaelder <j.schoenwaelder@jacobs-university.de>
To: Henry Yu <hyu2010b@gmail.com>
Cc: kwatsen@juniper.net, netconf@ietf.org
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Subject: Re: [Netconf] Does NMDA support synchronous configuration operation?
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If for certain devices configuration operations are synchronous (i.e.,
changes of <running> immediately and always lead to corresponding
changes of <operational>), then this should not be a problem for
clients that are written to deal with asynchronous behaviour.

Note that once you deal with pluggable hardware, you often loose the
synchronous behaviour since <running> and <operational> can deviate
depending on hardware resources present. (This may also be true for
pluggable software, i.e., software features controlled by licenses.)

/js

On Mon, Jun 25, 2018 at 02:28:41PM -0400, Henry Yu wrote:
> Hi Kent and all,
> 
> Thanks for your responses. It would be nice if the nmda-restconf (or
> nmda-netconf) would provide a narrative to explicitly point out the
> asynchronous behavior of the operations. Our developers have worked on
> products that provide RESTful APIs for device configuration, and those
> APIs are synchronous blocking calls that return to client only after
> the configurations are applied to hardware. When they implement
> RESTCONF server, they would naturally assume that RESTCONF operations
> are also synchronous in terms of applying config to the hardware.
> 
> Thanks,
> Henry
> 
> 
> On Mon, Jun 25, 2018 at 10:46 AM Kent Watsen <kwatsen@juniper.net> wrote:
> >
> >
> > Hi Henry,
> >
> > > In contrast, the definition of Synchronous Configuration Operation in
> > > [draft-ietf-netmod-opstate-reqs-04] states that "the server MUST fully
> > > attempt to apply the configuration change to all impacted components
> > > in the server, updating both the server's intended and applied
> > > configuration, before replying to the client. The reply to the client
> > > indicates whether there are any errors in the request or errors from
> > > applying the configuration change."
> >
> > It is accurate that both nmda-netconf and nmda-restconf drafts do not
> > yet implement this "requirement" (in quotes since the opstate-reqs
> > draft was never published as an RFC).
> >
> > Kent
> >
> >
> >

-- 
Juergen Schoenwaelder           Jacobs University Bremen gGmbH
Phone: +49 421 200 3587         Campus Ring 1 | 28759 Bremen | Germany
Fax:   +49 421 200 3103         <https://www.jacobs-university.de/>