Noel;
> From: Keith Moore <moore(_at_)cs(_dot_)utk(_dot_)edu>
> there are far too many problems to NAT, affecting far too many
> applications ... and the list is constantly growing larger.
Perhaps if there was a document that explained how to design an application
so that it worked through a NAT box, the list might not be growing so quickly?
Although I wouldn't want to be the person to write such a document, since
they're going to have to wade through hordes of flak from people who seem to
convinced that if they just flame enough about how worthless NAT boxes are,
and how they ought to be banned/exterminated, NAT boxes will go away. ("Back,
tides!")
You might have thought that NAT had made the Internet a collection of
private IP networks, which were acceptable.
However, the real problem of NAT is not of NAT itself but of NAT based
applicatins which are so network layer independent that they work over
non-IP networks.
NAT and NAT friendly application/transport protocols makes the Internet
a collection of private non-IP networks.
NAT is killing not only the Internet but also the IP protocol and a
standardization body for it.
For example, NAT friendly application/transport protocols for IP
telephony are H.323 and SIP.
Because SIP is so complex (even worse than H.323) and has no difficulty
to accomodate non-IP environment, SIP has lost the battle against H.323.
For telephony, the real battle should be fought between Internet
telephony and IP telephony over NAT with H.323 (Internet telephony
without NAT and IP telephony with NAT are opposite concepts).
The next thing to see is, what will happen between WAP and HTTP?
Masataka Ohta