Re: [netmod] <running> vs <intended>

[Martin Bjorklund <[e-mail]>]

Juergen Schoenwaelder <[e-mail]> wrote:
> On Mon, Sep 18, 2017 at 05:17:46PM +0100, Robert Wilton wrote:
> > 
> > > No.  I do not agree that the MUST in RFC 7950 can be removed.
> > > I do not agree the architecture should update YANG at all.
> > OK.
> 
> I am with Andy here. <running> has always had the requirement to be
> valid and we are not supposed to change that. Mechanisms for inactive
> configuration or templating must be designed to be backwards compatible
> I think.

Ok.  If we keep the requirement that <running> in itself must be
valid, it just restricts the usefulness/expressiveness of inactive and
template mechanisms, but it might be ok.

I think that even w/o this requirement, the observable behavior for a
client can be backwards compatible.  For example, suppose we have an
inactive access control rule that refers to a non-existing interface in
<running>.  If a client that doesn't know anything about inactive asks
for the contents of <running>, our implementation removes the inactive
nodes from the reply to the client.  Only a client that opts-in to
inactive will receive a reply with things that looks invalid if you
don't take the inactive annotation into account.



/martin