Re: Opportunistic Tunneling

[Pekka Savola <pekkas@netcore.fi>]

Hi,

On Wed, 25 Feb 2004, Bob Hinden wrote:
> >This is why the fundamental first question in considering the
> >"opportunistic" tunneling is whether you consider the deployment to be
> >"vendor-driven" or "user-driven".
> 
> I don't understand the distinction you suggest between "vendor-driven" or 
> "user-driven".

I tried to briefly describe this in the first message of the thread:

====
 1) Do we agree that this is something we need in the first place?
     * Considering user-driven deployment, maybe not.
        - example: the user says "I want to use application X" or "I
          want to use functionality Y", where X or Y would require
          IPv6.
     * Considering large-scale vendor-centric deployment, probably
       yes.
====

maybe this needs to be expanded; I have tried to describe this at more 
length below.

> Vendors will supply the products that most people will use 
> independent of how the products are used.  Most "users" don't write 
> specifications or write code.

Of course.

> Is the distinction whether the transition is driven from the middle (i.e., 
> an ISP providing native IPv6) or from the edge (via automatic tunneling 
> where the users ISP doesn't yet support native IPv6)?  Or something else?

Pretty close, yes.

I think this can be looked at from the perspective of who is driving 
the IPv6 deployment.

If the user wants to use an application (or something else) which
requires or would profit from IPv6, I consider the case "user-driven".  
The user says, "I want to do X", where X requires IPv6.  As the user 
has motivation for getting IPv6 connectivity, (s)he will be willing to 
do some effort to make it happen: e.g., contact his ISP, asking for a 
tunnel or native service, contact a tunnel broker, or whatever.  This 
is the model we've started with, I think.  Automatic mechanisms can 
help here as well, but they aren't strictly required IMHO.

Now, let's look at this from the different angle.  A vendor wants to
start using IPv6 in its products for some specific reason, independent
of what the user thinks.  For example, to simplify its peer-to-peer
applications.  To be able to deploy the new version of the
products/applications in any meaningful way, the vendor requires that
IPv6 connectivity must be available to all or at least significant
portion of the user base.  As there are thousands of ISPs in the
world, with only a few offering IPv6, "managed methods" as described
above are a non-starter.  The vendor requires *something* which will
be able to kickstart IPv6 deployment.  The deployment of automatic
tunneling mechanisms is this something.

Hope this clarifies..

-- 
Pekka Savola                 "You each name yourselves king, yet the
Netcore Oy                    kingdom bleeds."
Systems. Networks. Security. -- George R.R. Martin: A Clash of Kings