David Mayne wrote:
Dave Crocker wrote:
Given that most protocols do not have a 'testing' flag -- and they manage
to move into production quite nicely -- a different question might be why
such a flag is needed...
Hrm, let's see - the SMTP protocol has EXPN, VRFY, and, well RSET - meaning
I'm just kidding, reset the session and start over. POP3 has RSET too. What
about ping, and traceroute, in a more general sense ?
Skipping over the humor, for the moment, these underscore that one can add
features, albeit as options, without needing a 'testing' bit. As for ping and
traceroute, I don't understand. Traceroute isn't really a hack. It's a very
creative re-application of an existing protocol mechanism.
In the earlier days of DK, one of the hurdles I had to convince our
management it was a good idea to experiment with DK signing, was how would
receivers handle issues with our implementations,
And that's why I didn't say anything like "a test flag is a silly idea". It
isn't a silly idea. It just turns out that for the Internet, there's not much
history of needing the flag for functional purposes. And adding a long-term
protocol feature for short-term, political expedience seems like rather poor
engineering (on at least two counts.)
d/
ps. This sub-thread is academic. I'm not lobbying to change the protocol.
Just re-issuing my query about whether anyone knows of such a feature being
particularly helpful in any other Internet protocol.
--
Dave Crocker
Brandenburg InternetWorking
bbiw.net
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