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Re: [midcom] WG scope/deliverables

2001-01-31 16:20:02

--- Keith Moore <moore(_at_)cs(_dot_)utk(_dot_)edu> wrote:
Keith, why don't you start an NAT-Haters mailing list, and take all this
disgust with NAT's there? (I'm quite serious about this.)

Noel, 

I expressed an opinion that this group should confine itself to addressing
short-term goals rather than trying to make NATs a part of the Internet
architecture.  


With all due respect, Keith, you are saying that addressing NAT 
concerns should not be a short-term goal. You are OK with the WG
addressing firewall concerns however. 

But, insisting on this and repeating the mantra many times over,
even after the WG is formed with a specific mission and chater,
is really disruptive to the work being done in the WG. The charter 
requires the work group to address both NAT and firewall concerns.
It is very confusing and intimidating to the folks who are genuinely
trying to contribute. You jump on the bandwagon the moment someone
says anything about NAT. Soon it turns into a flaming fest.

I said this because I've looked at the problem quite extensively.
The more I have done so, the more have concluded that there's no way 
to restore the valuable functionality that NATs have removed from the 
Internet without providing another global address space, and that it's 
much more efficient and less painful to embellish the NATs to become 
IPv6 routers than it is to embellish both the NATs and applications to 
support a segmented address space.  

Well, I (and perhaps many others) respectfully disagree. 
This is not a short-term solution yet, not until folks have 
V6 networks deployed.
 

Thus, while I accept that the market needs a short-term solution to deal 
with NATs, I also am firmly of the opinion that it's a short-term solution.

So, if you do agree working that dealing with NATs is a short term solution,
why are you so repeatedly trying to torpedo the effort going in to solve 
the short term problems ?
 
IPv6 will be attractive for the same reasons that NAT was attractive - 
it will be the path of least pain to solving a pressing set of problems.


Agreed, perhaps with the exception of address renumbering. 
 
Being over-ambitious about goals has prevented more than one working 
group from accomplishing anything useful, and exhausted lots of 
talented people in the process.  I hardly think that advocating a little 
restraint in this group's ambition is sufficient justification for 
personal attacks.


This has been more than just a little advocation of restraint, I might add.

Keith

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Thanks.

regards,
suresh


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