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Re: Backwards compatability with existing IPv6 [was: Re: Network layer reqt? [was Re: Transport level multihoming]]



In the future, please restrict yourself to posting the URL for this
draft rather than the entire text.  


Ben

On Tue, Apr 10, 2001 at 10:08:44AM +0900, Masataka Ohta wrote:
> Sean;
> 
> >   I think you are missing the salient point.  I agree with Thomas
> > completely that arguing about whether changes should be accepted
> > or not accepted is ridiculous in the absence of any proposed changes
> > in the form that the wg can deal with in a normal IETF way.
> > 
> >   In other words, feel free to drop a draft onto the list.
> 
> I think this is the third time, but as you insist...
> 
> 						Masataka Ohta
> ---
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> INTERNET DRAFT                                                   M. Ohta
> draft-ohta-e2e-multihoming-01.txt          Tokyo Institute of Technology
>                                                               April 2001
> 
>                The Architecture of End to End Multihoming
> 
> Status of this Memo
> 
>    This document is an Internet-Draft and is in full conformance with
>    all provisions of Section 10 of RFC2026.
> 
>    Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering
>    Task Force (IETF), its areas, and its working groups.  Note that
>    other groups may also distribute working documents as Internet-
>    Drafts.
> 
>    Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months
>    and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any
>    time.  It is inappropriate to use Internet- Drafts as reference
>    material or to cite them other than as "work in progress."
> 
>    The list of current Internet-Drafts can be accessed at
>    http://www.ietf.org/ietf/1id-abstracts.txt
> 
>    The list of Internet-Draft Shadow Directories can be accessed at
>    http://www.ietf.org/shadow.html.
> 
>    Copyright (C) The Internet Society (March/5/2000).  All Rights
>    Reserved.
> 
> Abstract
> 
>    This memo describes the architecture of end to end multihoming.  End
>    to end multihoming does not burden routing system for multihoming.
>    That is, even extensive use of end to end multihoming does not
>    increase the number of entries in a global routing table.
> 
>    Traditionally with IPv4, multihoming capability is offered by an
>    intelligent routing system, which, as is always the case with
>    violating the end to end principle, lacks scalability on a global
>    routing table size and robustness against link failures.
> 
>    On the other hand, with end to end multihoming, multihoming is
>    supported by transport (TCP) or application layer (UDP etc.) of end
>    systems and does not introduce any problem in the network and works
>    as long as there is some connectivity between the end systems.
> 
>    Because end to end multihoming is performed in end systems, the
> 
> 
> 
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> 
> INTERNET DRAFT          End to End  Multihoming               April 2000
> 
> 
>    architecture needs no routing protocol changes. Instead, APIs and
>    applications must be modified to some extent.
> 
> 1. Introduction
> 
>    Multihoming is a way for hosts have robust connectivity to the
>    Internet.  Traditionally with IPv4, multihoming has been offered
>    through intelligence of routing system, that is, the end to end
>    principle has been ignored.
> 
>    However, as discussed in section 2, with the explosive deployment of
>    the Internet, as is always the case with intelligent networking, IPv4
>    style multihoming was revealed its lack of scalability and
>    robustness.
> 
>    Instead, multihoming can be supported based on the end to end
>    principle by assigning multiple addresses to an interface of a host
>    and let end systems choose an appropriate address at the transport or
>    the application layer.
> 
>    To support the end to end multihoming, no change is necessary on
>    routing protocols. Instead, APIs and applications must be modified to
>    detect and react against the loss of connection.  In case of TCP
>    where there is a network wide agreement on the semantics of the loss
>    of connectivity, most of the work can be done by the kernel code at
>    the transport layer, though some timing may be adjusted for some
>    application. However, in general, the condition of "loss of
>    connectivity" varies application by application that the multihoming
>    must directly be controlled by application programs.
> 
>    With IPV6, there is a partial effort of end to end multihoming that
>    it is of course that an interface has multiple addresses.
> 
>    However, because the principle of the end to end multihoming is
>    recognized merely subconsciously and because the current routing
>    architecture violates the end to end principle in various ways as a
>    result of partial attempt to avoid the lack of scalability of routing
>    table size, there are a lot of attempts:
> 
>       to keep the APIs and application programs as is
> 
>       to modify routing system intelligent to let it automatically offer
>       end to end multihoming
> 
>    which makes IPv6 multihoming as bad as that of IPv4.
> 
>    This memo describes why multihoming by intelligent routing system is
>    harmful, how the current routing architecture is damaged and how the
> 
> 
> 
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> INTERNET DRAFT          End to End  Multihoming               April 2000
> 
> 
>    APIs and the applications should be modified to implement the end to
>    end multihoming.
> 
> 2. Multihoming by Intelligent Routing System is Harmful
> 
> 2.1 Routing Table Size
> 
>    See IAB Network Layer Workshop.
> 
> 2.2 Lack of Robustness
> 
>    With route aggregation, routing information can be carried only for
>    an aggregated area that a loss of connectivity for a part of the area
>    can not be detected.
> 
>    For example, if a multihomed site with multiple subnets has a single
>    global routing table entry, and if a site is partitioned, only a part
>    of the partitioned can be reached with the global routing table
>    entry.
> 
>    A solution is to let all the subnets of the site (or, ultimately,
>    hosts) individually have global routing table entry, scalability of
>    which is so absurd that no one bothers to try.
> 
> 3. The Problems of Current Routing Architecture
> 
>    End systems (hosts) are end systems. To make the end to end principle
>    effectively work, the end systems must have all the available
>    knowledge to make decisions by the end systems themselves.
> 
>    With regard to multihoming, when an end system want to communicate
>    with a multihomed end system, the end system must be able to select
>    most appropriate (based on the local information) destination address
>    of the multihomed end system.
> 
>    However, some think it of course to separate routers and nodes and
>    let hosts not have routing information (which means the current IPv6
>    architecture is broken) and, worse, let most routers use default
>    routes.
> 
>    With detailed route information, end systems can use the information
>    as a hint to select the best destination address.  However, with
>    default route, end systems have no idea on what is the best address
>    and must blindly try all the possibilities at random.
> 
>    It was partly because full routing table was large and was not be
>    able to be held in a chip on end systems and partly because hosts
>    should not be affected by routing protocol changes.
> 
> 
> 
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> 
> 
>    In the past, IPv4 address was not assigned with hierarchy and scale
>    of integration was small.
> 
>    But, with smaller full routing table and larger scale of integration,
>    there is no reason not to have full routing table on every end
>    system.
> 
>    As there are a lot of routers used in LAN or even in home, it is not
>    so meaningful that we don't have to upgrade software on hosts, if we
>    have to upgrade software on routers.
> 
>    The situation is worse with multicasting.  For example, IGMP, which
>    separates routers and nodes, is a total nonsense as IGMP has been
>    revised several times upon multicast routing protocol changes.
>    Moreover, all the legacy multicast routing protocols use intelligent
>    routing system to deliver group specific information and does not
>    scale. Multicast architecture must be redone with the end to end
>    principle in mind. SM (Static Multicast) proposed by the Authors is
>    such a proposal but latter proposals (such as "simple multicast" or
>    "AS based static allocation") modified it without understanding the
>    underlying end to end principle and are useless.
> 
>    Once a full routing table is available on all the end systems, it is
>    easy for the end systems try all the destination addresses, from the
>    most and to the least favorable ones, based on the routing metric.
> 
>    Note that end to end multihoming works with the separation between
>    inter domain BGP and intra domain routing protocols, if BGP routers,
>    based on domain policy, assign external routes preference values
>    (metric) of intra domain routing protocols.
> 
>    One may still be allowed, though discouraged, to have local
>    configuration with dumb end systems and an intelligent proxy. But,
>    such configuration should be implemented with a protocol for purely
>    local use without damaging the global protocol.
> 
> 4. Modifications on APIs and Applications
> 
>    With TCP, applications must be able to pass multiple addresses to
>    transport layer (e.g. BSD socket). All the other processing can be
>    performed by transport layer (typically in kernel) using default or
>    application specific timing of TCP.
> 
>    TCP itself must be modified that all the possible addresses of a host
>    is transmitted to its peer through a TCP option. TCP connections are
>    identified with all the addresses constitute an identical connection.
> 
>    Without TCP, applications must be able to detect loss of connectivity
> 
> 
> 
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> 
> 
>    in application dependent way and try other addresses by themselves or
>    tell transport layer to do so.  Applications must still be able to
>    pass multiple addresses of the destination to transport layer (e.g.
>    BSD socket) to receive a packet to alternative addresses sent from
>    the other end of the communication.
> 
>    The easiest way for applications know all the addresses of the
>    destination is to use DNS. With DNS reverse, followed by forward,
>    lookup, applications can get a list of all the addresses of the
>    destination from an address of the destination.
> 
>    Note that selection of a source address violates the end to end
>    principle, because it must be selected as the destination address by
>    the other end of the communication using information local to the
>    other end of the communication.  With so much assymmetric routing of
>    the Internet today, proper destination address to reply can not be
>    guessed by the querier.
> 
>    Thus, DNS query should be modified to carry all the addresses of
>    clients and servers should try from the most favourable to the least
>    ones.
> 
>    With DNS, it is also required that DNS reverse lookup works properly.
>    But, as the reverse lookup is the mechanism to delegate IP addresses,
>    the requirement is no more demanding than assigning valid IP
>    addresses.
> 
>    A problem is that locally scoped address (IPv6 link and site local
>    addresses) can not be used for reverse look up. Use of 8+8 addressing
>    proposed by one of an Author with globally unique IID (Internet ID)
>    and ILOC (Internet Locator) is strongly encouraged. With 8+8
>    addressing, DNS reverse lookup can be performed with IID part only.
> 
>    Note that 8+8 proposal must not be confused by latter proposal of
>    routing goof by Mike O'dell, which is a proposal to use intelligent
>    routers to rewrite source addresses to prevent source address
>    spoofing and to tunnel between intelligent routers for pseudo
>    multihoming, both of which are against the end to end principle and,
>    thus, lacks rubustness and/or scalability.
> 
> 5. Conclusions
> 
>    For robust and scalable multihoming, IPv6 separation of nodes and
>    routers must be removed and the transition to the end to end
>    multihoming should occur with the transition to IPv6.
> 
>    The modification is not so difficult, because most of the
>    applications, which must be modified for IPV6 anyway, use TCP only
> 
> 
> 
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> INTERNET DRAFT          End to End  Multihoming               April 2000
> 
> 
>    and most of the UDP applications are DNS, which already tries all the
>    addresses, or multicast capable ones, which are hopeless.
> 
>    One may argue that we can't further delay the transition to IPv6
>    merely because of a random proposal on multihoming.
> 
>    Then, it is a good idea to start another transition, separated from
>    ones with legacy IPv6, by allocating a new address prefix of IPv6
>    address space for the end to end multihoming with 8+8 addressing.
> 
>    It is important to make the end to end principle work by keeping the
>    number of top level routing prefix under the new address prefix small
> 
>    Politics of address space allocation may be avoided if those who are
>    allocated IPv6 address space with the current prefix are
>    automatically allocated corresponding address space with the new
>    prefix.
> 
>    It should be noted that, because of the end to end nature, the
>    architecture can be implemented purely on end systems without
>    modifying routing functionality of existing IPv4 or IPv6 routers.
> 
> 6. Security Considerations
> 
>    The author believes there is no special security concern.
> 
> 7. Author's Address
> 
>    Masataka Ohta
>    Computer Center, Tokyo Institute of Technology
>    2-12-1, O-okayama, Meguro-ku, Tokyo 152-8550, JAPAN
> 
>    Phone: +81-3-5734-3299
>    Fax: +81-3-5734-3415
>    EMail: mohta@necom830.hpcl.titech.ac.jp
> 
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> 8. Full Copyright Statement
> 
>    "Copyright (C) The Internet Society (April/5/2001).  All Rights
>    Reserved.
> 
>    This document and translations of it may be copied and furnished to
>    others, and derivative works that comment on or otherwise explain it
>    or assist in its implementation may be prepared, copied, published
>    and distributed, in whole or in part, without restriction of any
>    kind, provided that the above copyright notice and this paragraph are
>    included on all such copies and derivative works.  However, this
>    document itself may not be modified in any way, such as by removing
>    the copyright notice or references to the Internet Society or other
>    Internet organizations, except as needed for the purpose of
>    developing Internet standards in which case the procedures for
>    copyrights defined in the Internet Standards process must be
>    followed, or as required to translate it into languages other than
>    English.
> 
>    The limited permissions granted above are perpetual and will not be
>    revoked by the Internet Society or its successors or assigns.
> 
>    This document and the information contained herein is provided on an
>    "AS IS" basis and THE INTERNET SOCIETY AND THE INTERNET ENGINEERING
>    TASK FORCE DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING
>    BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY THAT THE USE OF THE INFORMATION
>    HEREIN WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY RIGHTS OR ANY IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF
>    MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
> 
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