Re: [Netconf] Draft Charter Proposal for NETCONF WG

"Eric Voit (evoit)" <evoit@cisco.com> writes:

> From: Andy Bierman, Wednesday, March 1, 2017 11:00 AM
>
> On Wed, Mar 1, 2017 at 4:01 AM, Ladislav Lhotka <lhotka@nic.cz<mailto:lhotka@nic.cz>> wrote:
>
>> On 1 Mar 2017, at 10:58, t.petch <ietfc@btconnect.com<mailto:ietfc@btconnect.com>> wrote:
>>
>>
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "Juergen Schoenwaelder" <j.schoenwaelder@jacobs-university.de<mailto:j.schoenwaelder@jacobs-university.de>>
>> To: "Mehmet Ersue" <mersue@gmail.com<mailto:mersue@gmail.com>>
>> Cc: "'Netconf'" <netconf@ietf.org<mailto:netconf@ietf.org>>
>> Sent: Monday, February 27, 2017 10:14 PM
>>> On Mon, Feb 27, 2017 at 09:44:06PM +0100, Mehmet Ersue wrote:
>>>
>>>> 6. Revise the current NETCONF datastore concept as a protocol- and
>> modeling
>>>> language-independent standard as part of the network configuration
>>>> framework. Use the datastore solution proposal in
>>>> draft-ietf-netmod-revised-datastores as its basis. Will be used as a
>>>> normative reference in protocol specifications.
>>>
>>> There is no point in dupliating work in WGs that have a common history
>>> and a common set of active contributors.
>>
>> Juergen
>>
>> I am not sure what you are proposing;  Currently, datastores are poorly
>> described in RFC6241 and RFC7950 and the publication of another
>> incomplete description in the shape of
>> draft-ietf-netmod-revised-datastores
>> will likely make things worse.
>>
>> I see a need for a datastores RFC, probably separate from the current
>> specifications, and do see the NETCONF WG as better placed to do it.
>>
>> I think that the rush to  get
>> draft-ietf-netmod-revised-datastores
>> out is militating against the long term health of NETCONF.
>>
>
> I agree, and I would also add draft-ietf-netmod-schema-mount to it (of which I am a co-author).
>
> Original NETCONF and YANG were limited but (mostly) coherent and, in a way, simple and elegant. The recent developments are afterthoughts and kitchen sinks that will destroy these qualities.
>
> Instead of rushing with these documents, we should step back and think about a new architecture that could consistently support the new requirements.
>
> I think the entire approach to virtual servers is too complicated with schema-mount.
> Instead of keeping the protocol fixed and playing tricks with the data tree,
> it might be better to keep the current YANG we have, and enhance
> the protocols in order to access virtual servers from the 'real' server.
>
> <Eric> Both Schema Mount and Peer Mount allow local application
> referencing to remote information.  Life is easier for application
> developers as underlying transport protocols are abstracted away.
> Abstractions similar to Mount have proven themselves in other
> contexts.  I am hoping YANG mechanisms move more in this direction.

We should distinguish data mount from schema mount. Currently, getting
the content of YANG library and YANG modules listed therein is
sufficient for constructing the entire schema tree, and schema mount
should work the same, i.e. one shouldn't need to get any instance data
in order to construct the schema.

The confusing point here is that YANG library itself is exposed as state
data, but it should IMO be treated more as meta-data rather than regular
data.

>
> The answer to whether YANG is only for single device abstraction or
> also for multi-device abstractions is a fairly core proposition worth
> disambiguating in the NETMOD charter as well.  Per the thread above, I
> concur that if we continue down the ‘multi’ path, there may be
> implications to draft-ietf-netmod-revised-datastores.

I am not sure that I completely understand what you mean by multi-device
abstraction but I think that device-less abstraction is also worth
considering: apart from the particular client-server session context,
there appears to be a need for specifying (and standardizing) more
complex data models consisting of multiple modules, and augments (that
are used for this purpose e.g. in RFC 8022) are sometimes insufficient.

Lada

>
> Eric
>
>
> Lada
>
>
> Andy
>
>
>
>> Tom Petch
>>
>>> /js
>>>
>>> --
>>> Juergen Schoenwaelder           Jacobs University Bremen gGmbH
>>> Phone: +49 421 200 3587         Campus Ring 1 | 28759 Bremen | Germany
>>> Fax:   +49 421 200 3103         <http://www.jacobs-university.de/>
>>>
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> --
> Ladislav Lhotka, CZ.NIC Labs
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Ladislav Lhotka, CZ.NIC Labs
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