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Full edition in PDF format
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Posted: Thursday, July 10th, 2008

A Week of Firsts in Philadelphia

From the Editor’s Desk, by Mirjam Kühne

Independence Hall in Philadelphia

Like several other organizations (most notably some of the Network Operator Groups), the IETF took the opportunity of having many engineers in one room at one time to switch off the IPv4 network and make only the IPv6 network available, which they did during the IETF 71 plenary in Philadelphia (see below). The IPv4 outage experiment nearly coincided with a power outage, which took place just as Scott Bradner was presenting a report about the recent use of arbitration during the Nomination Committee process. This was the first time in the history of the NomCom that the arbitration process had to be employed (more on this in the plenary report). An-other interesting development in Philadelphia was a BoF on IDNA, which could lead to the formation of a new IDNA working group at the IETF 72 meeting in Dublin (see a report on the BoF on page 11).

We thank all of our contributors to this issue, and we wish you fun reading. As always, we welcome both your com-ments and your contributions for future issues.

Posted: Thursday, July 10th, 2008

The IETF Goes (IPv6) Native at IETF 71

By Leslie Daigle

At IETF 71 in Philadelphia, the IETF put the spotlight on the next generation of Internet addressing by switching off attendees’ access to IPv4 during its Wednesday plenary meeting. For an hour, Internet engineers could access the Internet only by using an IPv6 network; their machines had to connect to the network by using IPv6, and they could reach only other IPv6 Internet sites. The experience not only highlighted that IPv6 is a deployed reality; it also underscored the fact that there is a long way to go before there is as much content (and solid connectivity) as we are accustomed to in the predominantly IPv4-based Internet. (more…)

Posted: Thursday, July 10th, 2008

Message from the IETF Chair

By Russ Housley

I’m pleased to report that IETF 71, held in Philadelphia in March 2008 was an enormously successful meeting. We had 1,131 people from 49 different countries in attendance. Comcast was the host and certainly made everyone feel welcome. Comcast provided an impressive 80-gigabit-per-second primary fiber link to the Philadelphia Downtown Marriott, where the meeting was held (if the router line cards had been available, the link could have been upgraded to 100 gigabits per second). Unfortunately, the IETF was unable to generate enough traffic to consume half of the available bandwidth despite a challenge to do so. The site network was subcontracted to VeriLAN Networks. And, as in the past, the success of the meeting depended on a number of dedicated volunteers. Thank you all. (more…)

Posted: Thursday, July 10th, 2008

Words from the IAB Chair

By Olaf Kolkman

A proven method for performing architectural work is by publishing architectural documents/RFCs. It is not the only method by which the Internet Architecture Board (IAB) works. There are the technical plenaries - subject of my last column; there is the IAB’s input during BOF and working group creation; there are workshops with workshop reports as their outcomes; and there are the statements we publish on our Web site or on relevant mailing lists. (more…)

Posted: Thursday, July 10th, 2008

Plenary Report

By Mirjam Kühne

We have made substantial progress in our efforts to develop Internet technology,” announced John Schanz, who spoke about Internet developments from the past 15 years on behalf of Comcast, the host of IETF 71. “And those efforts have not only had a substantial impact on most industries; they have also enhanced global capabilities for all.” Mirjam Kühne (more…)

Posted: Thursday, July 10th, 2008

IDNA Revisited

By Wendy Rickard
This article is based on an IDNA BoF held at IETF 71 in Philadelphia.

In the five years since the original protocol for Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs) was completed and deployed, a handful of new developments, together with a number of real or perceived defects or inadequacies in the original protocol, has led to a desire to revise and upgrade the standard. Those efforts, which are now being undertaken by the new IDNAbis working group (WG), were topics discussed during a BoF (birds of a feather) meeting in March at IETF 71 in Philadelphia. (more…)

Posted: Thursday, July 10th, 2008

ISOC Fellows Come to Philadelphia for IETF 71

Report from the ISOC Fellowship Programme

As part of its long tradition of helping build technical capacity in less-developed countries, the Internet Society (ISOC) Fellowship to the IETF programme continues to bring technologists from developing regions to IETF meetings.

In March 2008, six Fellows attended IETF 71 in Philadelphia. ISOC covers the cost of attending the meeting and pairs each Fellow with an IETF veteran, who serves as their meeting mentor. (more…)

Posted: Thursday, July 10th, 2008

ISOC Fellow Vincent Ngundi: At Home at the IETF

By Wendy Rickard

An engineer from Kenya speaks with the IETF Journal about becoming an Internaut and making his way to the IETF.

“Long live this noble initiative,” declares Vincent Ngundi when speaking about the ISOC Fellowship to the IETF programme. The native Kenyan travelled the long road from Nairobi to Philadelphia in March for IETF 71, and unlike many other fellows, the transition from one culture to another was not too much of a shock for him. (more…)

Posted: Thursday, July 10th, 2008

Working with ITU-T: The MPLS Transport Profile Case

By Loa Andersson and Stewart Bryant

The International Telecommunication Union Telecommunication Standardization Sector (ITU-T) and the IETF have agreed that the next-generation transport network will be based on MPLS (multiprotocol-label-switching) technology developed within the IETF. It has been mutually agreed that the IETF and ITU will work together to extend IETF MPLS functionality to address the needs of the transport network. The work will move forward with the recognitions that the sole design authority for MPLS resides within the IETF and that expertise for Transport Network Infrastructure resides within ITU-T Study Group (SG) 15. (more…)

Posted: Thursday, July 10th, 2008

DHCPv6 Is Getting to Be a Mature Technology

By Alain Durand
About three years ago, when Comcast started to look at production-grade DHCPv6 servers, not much was available. Sure, there were a few proof-of-concept codes here and there, but nothing we would dare use in production. Things have changed quite a bit since then. (more…)

Posted: Thursday, July 10th, 2008

IRTF Report

By Aaron Falk

What follows are summaries of several upates on the Internet Research Groups (RGs), some of which were reported during the Technical Plenary at IETF 71.

Currently, 14 RGs are working on topics related to Internet protocols, applica-tions, architecture, and technology. Some groups have significant ties to IETF work; others, not so much. Most RGs are open, and all maintain open mailing lists. There is room for overlap in scope between RGs, and the management style within each group is diverse. (more…)

Posted: Thursday, July 10th, 2008

Recent IESG Document and Protocol Actions

Listing of recent IESG Document and Protocol Actions (more…)

Posted: Thursday, July 10th, 2008

IETF Meeting Calendar

IETF 72
27 July - 1 August 2008
Host: Alcatel-Lucent
Location: Dublin, Ireland

IETF 73
16 - 21 November 2008
Host: Google
Location: Minneapolis, MN, USA

IETF 74
22 - 27 March 2009
Host: TBD
Location: San Francisco, CA, USA

IETF 75
26 - 31 July 2009
Host: .SE
Location: Stockholm, Sweden

Posted: Thursday, July 10th, 2008

Photo Gallery

Photos by Patrik Fältström and Peter Löthberg (more…)

Posted: Thursday, July 10th, 2008