Re: [tram] Adam Roach's Discuss on draft-ietf-tram-stun-pmtud-10: (with DISCUSS and COMMENT)

[Simon Perreault <[e-mail]>]

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DISCUSS:
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This seems like an interesting technique that warrants collection of operational
experience.

>From a process perspective, I think we have a bit of an issue, unless I've
overlooked something relevant. This is proposed as a Standards-Track document,
but it relies on the use of the PADDING attribute defined in RFC 5780. RFC
5780 is Experimental, so this is a formal downref. And RFC 5780 does not
appear in the downref registry [1], nor did the IETF last call [2] include a
request that the IETF community consider allowing such a refernce.

>From a practical perspective, the mechanism described in this document seems
like the kind of thing that it would be useful to gather operational experience
with prior to putting it on the standards track. I have some operational
concerns (described below) that I think could be either proven out or dispelled
by experimental deployment of the technology.

My recommendation is to recategorize this mechanism as experimental, adding some
text about the desire to gather operational experience.

For avoidance of doubt: My DISCUSS is only on the process issue, and I'll
happily clear regardless of how this issue is rationalized (e.g., either by
running IETF last call again, by reclassifying this mechanism as experimental,
or perhaps some novel solution that I may not have thought of). Everything
else is merely a recommendation.

I don't think I've seen a specific response to Adam's point here, which I believe is that one of (at least) three things should happen -

- a second Last Call, explicitly calling out this downref, OR

- approval as an Experimental RFC, which makes the downref issue go away, OR

- (and this didn't happen in this thread, but in some conversation, I remember that) Adam wondered if reusing the PADDING attribute was the right thing to do (and that was a question, not a concern, but relevant here, since if this document defined its own attribute, the downref would also go away).

Any thoughts on this?

Spencer, Adam,

I see an easy fourth option:

- Pull the definition of PADDING into this document. Declare that we've gathered sufficient experience with PADDING that it now warrants being elevated to Standards Track. That is, it's been proven to work.

I’m fine with whatever, for the record.

Simon