Subject: RE: Operational Renumbering Procedure

From: Fred Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 28 Apr 2003 07:02:45 -0700

At 12:00 PM 4/28/2003 +0300, Pekka Savola wrote:
>(The ordering I've always had in mind to get around certain issues is to 
>try to instantaneously both deprecate the old addresses and introduce the 
>new ones -- to avoid dual-use.)

I think I need to ask you something. The title of the draft is "Procedures 
for Renumbering an IPv6 Network without a Flag Day". What you describe here 
- the simultaneous deprecation of the old and introduction of the new - is 
a flag day. Are you asking me to make having a flag day a premise? 

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From: Pekka Savola <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 28 Apr 2003 17:36:47 +0300 (EEST)

> a flag day. Are you asking me to make having a flag day a premise? 

There may or may not be ways to achieve renumbering without a "flag day".

Renumbering is difficult enough even if there *will* be a flag day to 
warrant pursuing both approaches (but not necessarily in the same document 
of course).

The flag day argument has been made about Internet.  I totally agree, flag
days are not possible.  A similar argument can be made about most ISP's
(only very minor ones could be able synchronize it with their customers).
But renumbering these is not the really difficult issue.

End-sites would prefer renumbering without flag days, but if they have to
bear it, they can endure one: it just has a cost label attached to it.  
And really, in the end, a properly executed & aided renumbering operation
might not take more than minutes/hours to get into a "reasonably working"  
state (plan a time, make the network infrastructure ready, reduce DNS
TTL's, lease times, autoconfigure the old prefixes, etc.).

But the requirement for no flag day also has complications and tradeoffs 
attached to it.

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