Subject: State of BGMP

From: Sandy Harris <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 15 Oct 2000 20:56:48 -0400

I'm just starting to look at multicast issues. At first glance,
things do not look encouraging.

Looking at IETF pages, the BGMP draft has expired. I see no sign of a
new draft and no announcement of advance to RFC status. From the
archive, this mailing list appears moribund. There's more spam than
real content in the last few months.

What am I missing?

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From: [email-masked] (Jeremy Hall)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2000 02:49:26 -0400 (EDT)

If memory serves, BGMP has some problems on lans.  From time to time, the
multicast pendulum swings from source-based trees to shared trees.  The
Network Operators are currently drifting towards sourced-based
trees.  This means BGMP gets less than optimal attention.

Without going into a long drawn out debate concerning the merits of this,
let me just say the following.  For YEARS, multicast has progressed in
many diversified directions, each with its strengths and
weaknesses.  Some want flood-and-prune based protocols, like DVMRP or PIM
DENSE mode.  Some want sparse-based trees, where the receiver requests
what he wants.  Some want CBT, even still, some want MOSPF.

Without going on and on, each protocol here has its supporters and
hecklers, but because the multicast community is not unified in what it
wants, things don't move very rapidly.  Is there any wonder application
developers are gingerly supporting IGMPV2, some now IGMPV3.  None of these
address security and multicast, something people are quietly sweeping
under the rug.  The only reason MBGP, or BGP4++, or BGP4+ (we can't agree
on the name of the thing) got deployed was because we all agree it should
be used to connect domains together (like unicast currently does)

The router vendors picked a side, and this time the same side, and
deployed both MBGP and MSDP.  The key to moving forward is to ralley
behind whatever is moving most rapidly, or, come up with your own winning
solution and convince your supporters to swing in your direction.  The
current trend is to swing towards something called PIM-SSM, Single Source
Multicast.  Here, we are reinventing satellite transmissions for
marketing, maybe it will fly.

I hope I have answered your questions and at the same time haven't ruffled
TOO many feathers; it's just the way I see it.

That said, I DO believe we will have a need for BGMP eventually.  There
may come a day when conferencing or distance learning or something of the
sort takes off.  When it does, we will need to be able to transport that
material in a useful way.  When Multicast takes off and people figure out
what it can do for them, we will be addressing these issues again that we
have for so long been battling.  The words expressed in this message
reflect personal observation, and do not necessarily reflect the views of
the BGMP working group chairs.

_J

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From: Dave Thaler <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 18 Oct 2000 12:52:36 -0700 (PDT)

> real content in the last few months.

A new BGMP draft will appear before the next IETF, but as Jeremy
stated, there's currently no urgent demand for the scenarios that
BGMP enables, although we expect there to be in the future.
So it's not dead, just perhaps less critical at the moment than 
other items the same people are working on.

-Dave