Subject: [midcom] Protocol decision reminder

From: Melinda Shore <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 10 Dec 2002 08:32:09 -0500

I'd like to remind everyone that we're now in the process of
going through the protocols, as ranked in the protocol
evaluation document, and determining one-by-one their
suitability for use as the midcom protocol.  

If someone cannot come up with a technical argument for why
SNMPv3 does not meet the midcom requirements and framework
it will become the midcom protocol.  If there are no such
comments by the end of the week, SNMPv3 will become the
midcom protocol.

Thanks,

Melinda
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From: Jonathan Rosenberg <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 10 Dec 2002 11:42:34 -0500

Well, I have a question.

Has anyone gone through the semantics document in detail and analyzed 
whether or not the abstract protocol can be mapped into SNMP, and 
specifically, whether SMI is a sufficient data model for what we need to 
do? I am not saying it isn't, I am merely saying that we better be sure 
it is OK before selecting SNMP. To be honest, the requirements and 
framework, which form the basis of the evaluation, are really high 
level. The devil with midcom is in the details, which have received 
scant attention. I fear that we might make a choice and then find that 
some detailed operation we want to do cannot be accomplished.

Thanks,
Jonathan R.

-- 
Jonathan D. Rosenberg, Ph.D.                72 Eagle Rock Ave.
Chief Scientist                             First Floor
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From: Juergen Quittek <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 11 Dec 2002 00:46:16 +0100

Looks like a busy day on the mailing list.
Let's try to summarize the issues.
So far, three arguments have been raised:

1. SNMPv3 might not match the semantics (that are under development
2. SNMPv3 performance migth be insufficient
3. SNMPv3 might interoperate well with key distribution infrastructures

On 1: David checked the semantics and says it is implementable with SNMP
      although SNMP is not a perfect match.  I think the reason is, that
      when chose a transaction model for defining the semantics we did
      customize it for SNMP (but had SNMP as one option in mind).  Maybe
      we should adapt the model slightly in case the WG chooses SNMP.
      I don't think, this would be a big problem, but it might not be
      necessary at all.

On 2: This is an interesting issue to investigate.  There is no requirement
      on performance yet.  Our first step could be specifying this requirement.
      However, the requirement discussion was closed some time before.  Do we
      really want to open it again?

On 3: Since Melinda explicitly asks for arguments why SNMPv3 does not meet
      the requirements: the user-based security model defined in RFC 2574
      is explicitly defined to be open to other security mechanisms as the
      few ones described in the RFC. Can anyone explain, why this does not
      hold for one or the other particular key distribution infrastructure?

    Juergen