[oam] Joint Design Session on Forwarding Plane Operations, Administration and Maintenance (OAM)

[Ronald Bonica <[e-mail]>]

The IAB and IESG would like to announce a joint design session on Forwarding Plane Operations, Administration and Maintenance (OAM) to be held on October 12 through October 14 at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia, USA.
 
IP and ICMP support very simple forwarding plane diagnostic tools (e.g., PING, TRACEROUTE). During the Internet's first decades, these tools fulfilled most operational requirements. However, during the last decade, network operators have deployed many technologies that rely upon tunneling. These technologies include Pseudo-wires, Layer 2 Virtual Private Networks, and Layer 3 Virtual Private Networks. While the internet community has enhanced its forwarding plane diagnostic tool kit with the deployment of Bidirectional Forwarding Detection (BFD), some suggest that the tool kit is still inadequate for tunneled applications. 
 
The purpose of this design session is to discover and document operational requirements and constraints for tunneled forwarding plane OAM. The design session will also entertain solution proposals. While most activity in this area has been associated with Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS), session organizers also encourage generic proposals that include other tunneling mechanisms (e.g., IP-in-IP).
 
The scope of this design session is limited to the forwarding plane. Proposals concerning control and management plane protocols will not be accepted. For example, a proposal that probes a tunnel for continuity would be acceptable, while a proposal for reporting tunnel continuity to a routing protocol or management station would be productive, but beyond the scope of this workshop.
 
Those intending to make presentations must submit position papers to the IAB/IESG by September 24. Position papers should constitute one to five pages on the problem or solution space, with a particular emphasis on areas that the IETF should address or revisit. Evaluation of the position papers will be performed by a committee consisting of IESG and IAB members. A limited number of seats will be available for persons not presenting.
 
Position papers will be made publicly available. On the basis of the position papers, a number of invited speakers will be asked to present at the workshop. A final agenda with timeslots will be published by October 1. 
 
 
Further information about position paper submission procedures are forthcoming. Interested parties are advised to subscribe to the oam at ietf.org mailing list for discussion and announcements related to the workshop. Additional information will be available at http://www3.tools.ietf.org/area/ops/trac/wiki/oamJDS.

                                                Ron Bonica, IESG
                                                Danny McPherson, IAB
                                                Hannes Tschofenig, IAB