Subject: WG Last Call for "DHCP Relay Agent Information Option" I-D

From: Ralph Droms <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2000 09:12:14 -0500

This is the WG last call for "DHCP Relay Agent Information Option", 
<draft-ietf-dhc-agent-options-08.txt>.  If you have any comments about this 
I-D, please respond to this mailing list.  The last call discussion will 
close on Wednesday, 2/9.

- Ralph Droms

---

From: Ted Lemon <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2000 11:28:56 -0500

I respectfully request that the draft be withdrawn until my objections
to it, which I have expressed previously and in detail, have been
addressed.

To summarize, I believe that the implementation of the subnet mask
suboption has not been described completely, and is likely to result
in multiple non-interoperable implementations.  The solution that I
propose is to seperate the subnet mask suboption into its own draft,
and try to do it justice there.  I think it's a reasonable idea, but
it needs to be fleshed out some more.   I don't want to see the Relay
Agent Information Option draft delayed until we have a better
specification for the subnet mask suboption.

In case anybody's thinking "aw, it's not such a big problem, why are
you so worried," please remember all the discussions we've had about
seemingly subtle points in RFC2132 like what the DHCP parameter
request list option does.   The subnet mask suboption clearly has
wider implications, and yet the description of it is equally brief -
all that's described is the format of the option, and the meaning of
the bits in it.   No requirements are placed on either the server or
the relay agent.   This is a recipe for disaster.

I'm really sorry to be a stick-in-the-mud about this.  Michael Patrick
has worked hard on this draft, and deserves some satisfaction.  It is
partially my fault that we're at the point we are at - if I had
carefully read the several previous versions of the draft in which the
suboption was added, I could have raised my objections sooner, and
perhaps we could have fixed the wording in time for the subnet mask
suboption to be in the draft.  However, this fact is not a reason not
to do the right thing - it is merely evidence of a failure on my part,
for which I apologize.

			       _MelloN_