There are, in my opinion, two problems with Mr. Yevstifeyev's assertion
below that it is easy to determine when things are out of use.
The first point, to echo Andrew Sullivan, is that even if a protocol is
in use on the public Internet, it is not always easy to detect. It may
be used in only some portions of the net. It may be used inside some
other protocol that makies detection ahrder.
The second point is that enterprise uses and other private network uses
are still valid uses. The fact that a protocol may be used only inside
a virtual private network, or only inside a corporate data center, or in
only within a military facility, does NOT mean that it is not used.
Such limited use is still valid use and should not result in our
declaring something obsolete.
Yours,
Joel
On 3/3/2011 4:27 AM, Mykyta Yevstifeyev wrote:
Hello Eliot,
Thank you for reading the document. Pleas efind some comments in-line.
2011/3/2, Eliot Lear<lear(_at_)cisco(_dot_)com>:
...
I bring to your attention RFC-4450, in which we made a bulk status
change of a bunch of PS to Historic precisely because we couldn't find
anyone using those protocols. However, such observations are
imprecise. For one, it is hard to observe what is going on on the
Internet, and those who do don't usually share their data (there is
some, but it is often regionally based, like the GINORMOUS store at
ETHZ). Another issue is that a protocol that is not detectable on the
Internet might be in use on private networks.
When we say 'out-of-use' we consider the usage of something in the
overall Internet. It is mostly not very difficault to find this out
via those people who take part in the IETF.
...
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