Strategy for VPN work in IETF

[Brian E Carpenter]

My spam filters decided to put it in the junk. But it neatly
illustrates the issue we have when the I* tries to look at
the big picture, and a special interest group looks only at its
own small area - there is a genuine conflict of interest, and
the IETF and its processes are set up to favour the big picture.
That is not a problem IMHO. It's exactly correct, except that we 
have to explain it better to the special interest groups.

   Brian

"Wijnen, Bert (Bert)" wrote:
> 
> Isn't it nice to "accuse" while not having to identify yourself.
> We will certainly take this anonymous positive advise to heart.
> 
> Thanks,
> Bert
> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: auto92679 at hushmail.com [mailto:auto92679 at hushmail.com]
> > Sent: zondag 4 mei 2003 22:25
> > To: ppvpn at nortelnetworks.com
> > Cc: problem-statement at alvestrand.no
> > Subject: Strategy for VPN work in IETF
> >
> >
> >
> > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> > Hash: SHA1
> >
> > Alex Zinin writes:
> >
> > > Since San Francisco IETF meeting the IESG has been considering the
> > > situation in the SUB-IP area and in the PPVPN Working Group in
> > > particular.
> >
> > > Such close attention to this WG was triggered by numerous concerns
> >
> > > thatthe IESG members received from the WG participants about limited
> > > and slow progress within the WG despite the efforts of the WG chairs
> > > and its members. The IESG also used this opportunity to consider
> > > the IETF area that the PPVPN work would fit best.
> >
> > > After much deliberation, the involved ADs (Bert, Thomas, and I) are
> > > considering the following organizational changes in order to
> > > improve WG focus and productivity and ensure faster progress of the
> > > VPN-related work:
> >
> > > 1. Split of Layer-2 and Layer-3 VPN work in separate Working Groups.
> >
> > >   The L2 and L3 VPN work spaces are each big enough to warrant a
> > >   separate WG. While concentration of all VPN-related work in a
> > >   single forum was the right thing to do to ensure coordination
> > >   of efforts when the PPVPN WG was created and L2 VPN work came in,
> >
> > >   such concentration is causing scaling problems within the WG at
> > >   this moment.
> >
> > >   Migration of work into two separate WGs for L2 and L3 VPN
> > >   technologies with more specific WG charters will help to focus
> > >   discussions, prevent staff and meeting time overloading, and will
> > >   aid faster progress of corresponding technologies.
> >
> > Alex,
> > The proposed solution ignores the origins of the problem.
> >
> > The fact that PPVPN has been making any progress at all, despite the
> > bureaucracy imposed on it by the IESG is rather comendable.
> >
> > This is a typically example of a WG which was setup despite
> > many architectural
> > objections that it doesn't fit in the "internet" design. One
> > cannot help
> > but to suspect that there was the hope ammoung the inner circles that
> > it would fail altogether. At least giving the ammount of "framework"
> > nonsense required and the interdiction to discuss solutions before a
> > framework is agreed upon.
> >
> > The work of this working group is particularly harder given that this
> > is todays "fashion" area... work is much harder on such areas
> > (like mpls
> > was a couple of years ago). One would suspect that the IESG
> > efforts to slow the WG steem also from concerns that fashion
> > areas tend
> > to create a fair ammount of nonsense proposals most of which tend to
> > be naturally eliminated by the WGs.
> >
> > Given the environment the performance of the ppvpn WG seems to me to
> > rather positive. It has actually come up with several documents that
> > are useful and deserve publication.
> >
> > One of the reasons given here for this proposed disolution of the WG
> > is that the "L2VPN and L3VPN work spaces are big enought".
> > However both
> > in the list and WG meetings it seems to me that the current l3vpn WG
> > is close to 0. The base document on l3vpn has been rather stable for
> > a while and it is not likely to change. The IESG/inner-circle
> > has chosen
> > for mostly ideological reasons to attempt to marginalize this work so
> > it can hardly expect to be heard now.
> >
> > It seems to me that if there is a problem w/ PPVPN that problem lies
> > within the IESG itself. As such i would like to propose to split the
> > IESG in two WGs: one that concerns itself w/ architecture and
> > one group
> > that concerns itself with the process of documenting
> > interoperable solutions
> > that are not known to be good or bad ideas until used in pratice. This
> > latter group should have the task to assure that the process is fair
> > and that both the pluses and minus of a solution are
> > considered and documented.
> >
> >
> > One of the ideal caractheristics of the latter group would be if they
> > where to realize that by definition an IESG member is much less of an
> > expert in a given domain than the membership of the WG it steers. It
> > is humanly impossible for it to be otherwise. Unless you assume that
> > the membership of WG is 100% incompetent which is never the
> > case. A steerer
> > cannot possibly be an expert in 20 groups it oversees...
> > usually it can't
> > even keep up with the problems and technology due to the fact
> > that there
> > is only 24 hours in each day.
> >
> > In the rather arrogant terms of internet engineering, the IESG is by
> > definition the set of people that are "clueless". It is not possible
> > for it to be the other way around. No matter how wise and inteligent
> > IESG memebers are...
> >
> > It is necessarly that the IESG understands that latter point
> > and restricts
> > its job to document in a timely manner interoperable solutions for the
> > problems at hand regardless of personal opinion on the value of such
> > problems and technologies.
> > - ----
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-- 
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Brian E Carpenter 
Distinguished Engineer, Internet Standards & Technology, IBM 
On assignment at the IBM Zurich Laboratory, Switzerland