# (2.2) IP-layer communications: For an OPES framework standardized in
# the IETF, the OPES intermediary must be explicitly addressed at the
# IP layer by the end user.
The above clause in draft-iab-opes-01.txt, taken literally as I
understand it,
constrains that only single-intermediary content processing pipeline
will be
possible under OPES.
Q1, to IAB:
Would the IAB shed some light on the benefits of
stipulating n=1 (as in an n-intermediary OPES content
pipeline), such that they outweigh the cost of depriving
content providers and consumers the advantages that n>=1
offers, as exemplified in the use cases above?
It was not our intention (or my intention, at any rate) to comment
on the issue of a n-intermediary OPES content pipeline one way or
another.
Q2, to IAB & all:
Can the "explicit addressing at the IP layer by the end user,"
which I take it for the need of the end user's cognizance of
the remote IP address in the end_user-intermediary socket
connection, be critically meaningful for OPES practitioners
anyway in the face of NAT (which, incidentally, was yet
another IETF whipping boy)?
I am not going to try to give a precise definition of "explicit
addressing at the IP layer by the end user", given the complications
of NATs. But I think it is fair to say that it does not include
OPES intermediaries intercepting and acting on packets that have
somebody else's destination IP address in the IP header when they
arrive at the OPES intermediary.
- Sally