Maybe we need to help make it easy to GET assignments of blocks of addresses
for individuals/small businesses/etc. Part of the problem is the obvious:
IPv4 addresses are running short. Part is the "K-Mart" level of product
understanding I've experienced with many vendors of Internet connectivity.
When I asked a cable IP vendor about getting a static address assignment,
the (sales) person said, "Oh, there's no static, it's the Internet." <sigh>
That's a priceless quote, but frankly dial-up vendors weren't any better.
The first is an engineering problem, and we're working on that one (IPv6),
right? :-) The second is a market problem, and I don't think it's going to
go away until either telcos realize that they need to make a commitment to
being in the IP business (and train their staff), or we have meaningful
alternatives to the telcos for individual connectivity.
From the individual user's perspective, NAT does seem a lot easier. You
hook computer A to the ISP, computers B and C to computer A, and everyone
can surf -- cool. I AM a networking geek, and NAT was a lot easier (and
cheaper) than the alternatives. I suspect it will remain so for at least a
while -- Ian
-----Original Message-----
From: Keith Moore [mailto:moore(_at_)cs(_dot_)utk(_dot_)edu]
Sent: Sunday, April 23, 2000 8:44 PM
To: Dick St.Peters
Cc: ietf(_at_)ietf(_dot_)org
Subject: Re: draft-ietf-nat-protocol-complications-02.txt
Most users are not
networking geeks. They like NAT because NAT boxes make
what they want
to do so easy.
presumably they don't realize that the NATs are making it hard
to do other things that they might want to do.
I wonder...how many of these folks really want network address
translation, versus those who just want the other things that
NAT boxes often do? (DHCP, firewall, hub, router, all with
really easy setup)
maybe we need to make it as easy to connect a small net to the
Internet, as it is to connect a host.
Keith