Subject: ALF?

From: "Paul Long" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 6 May 2001 20:08:36 -0500

I was thinking that the "ALF" part of "UDP/ALF" referred to a specific
protocol, e.g., a simple retransmission protocol, or some kind of
standardized framing, e.g., TPKT; however, it seems to be just a loose
concept and not embodied in a separate RFC or somesuch. Is this correct? Is
there a distinction being made between UDP and UDP/ALF? My best guess is
that, in Megaco/H.248, ALF is just the retransmission scheme described in
Annex D and nothing more, right?

Paul Long
ipDialog, Inc.

---

From: Christian Groves <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 07 May 2001 12:38:11 +1000

G'Day Paul,

ALF is small furry alien.... (sorry I couldn't help myself).

Application Layer Framing as you say is not a protocol. Its use in
Megaco/H.248 came out of IETF meeting in 99. Some parties were arguing
for separation between H.248/Megaco and its transports other were
arguing a tighter coupling. ALF is the later. Brian is the expert on
this.

Cheers, Christian