> OPES is defining an intermediary architecture for applications level content
> management services. Owners of the "Ends" are aware these services are
> being performed explicitly requesting or allowing them.
That may (or may not) be the case with midcom,
as well. What we're doing, though, is trying to
craft an environment in which packets really
do flow end-to-end as far as the application is
concerned. It may take some futzing around with
a middlebox (opening a pinhole in a firewall, for
example) before the data start flowing. A
conferencing endpoint, for example, may take a
look at its own signaling streams, get authenticated
and authorized, and tell the firewall what address/
port tuples it needs to allow to pass. Or it may
be the case that some sort of call control server
lies in the call signaling path anyway, and it can
handle dealing with the middlebox. In any event,
we do not assume that packet flows terminate on
the middlebox.
Melinda