RE: Statements against new.net?

From: Valdis.Kletnieks@vt.edu [mailto:Valdis.Kletnieks@vt.edu]
Sent: Tuesday, March 13, 2001 1:14 PM

> By the sheer fact that they included a non-technical value-judgment.

OK.. I'm going to cite chapter and verse:

You might want to calm down a bit. I'm out of the game now anyway (at least,
this round). BTW, I read the original when it was first published. There is
zero technical content, in the original. to whit;

Summary

   To remain a global network, the Internet requires the
existence of a
   globally unique public name space. The DNS name space is a
   hierarchical name space derived from a single, globally
unique root.
   This is a technical constraint inherent in the design of the DNS.

False. It is not a constraint, it results from a restricted implementation.

   Therefore it is not technically feasible for there to be more than
   one root in the public DNS.

Improper conclusion based on a false premise. SRS has shown that root-root
synchronization can happen. Probably easier than TLD-TLD syncs, because the
rate of change is much lower. That's a
real-world-and-already-widely-implemented example for you. It gets better,
SRS was already widely deployed BEFORE the IAB published their comment. They
just had trouble connecting the dots.

That one root must be
supported by a set
   of coordinated root servers administered by a unique naming
   authority.

This statement is a pure non-technical value-judgement, supporting the
legacy implementation, and is entirely self-serving. Of course, this
statement, itself, is also a value-judgement. However, note that the defeat
of the false premise, and it's direct improper conclusion, make this
statement a pure political phrase.

   Put simply, deploying multiple public DNS roots would raise a very
   strong possibility that users of different ISPs who click
on the same
   link on a web page could end up at different destinations, against
   the will of the web page designers.

This entire paragraph is a NOP. Webpage designers would never link to
external resources under such condition as stated here. Those that do,
deserve to get appendages whacked.

   This does not preclude private networks from operating their own
   private name spaces, but if they wish to make use of names uniquely
   defined for the global Internet, they have to fetch that
information
   from the global DNS naming hierarchy, and in particular from the
   coordinated root servers of the global DNS naming hierarchy.

OK? Read that. Read it again. Read it a third time. *ALL* that
says is "If you want to agree what the DNS tree looks like, you have
to share a root. If you want your own view, use your own root.
That's the way DNS is. You're stuck with the fact that DNS works
that way. You have to make your own choice which root to use".

You really should calm down. I use external programs to build db.root.zone
files, from external sources. All of the ORSC agrees to the core TLDs, which
includes the legacy roots, and there are dispute proceedures for handeling
collisions.

RFC2826 SAYS YOU HAVE TO CHOOSE FOR YOURSELF. Which is more important
to *YOU*? 100% consistency with the rest of the world, or access to
your private name space? *YOU* evaluate, *YOU* choose, and RFC2826 is
nice enough to point out the problems you'll encounter.

It is not at all an either/or situation. There *is* the path of
"accommodation".

Now, what non-technical value judgment did you say that RFC2826 was
making for you? It's not a "value judgment" that using multiple roots
with DNS results in inconsistencies, it's *the way DNS works*.

see above.

I suppose the *next* thing we'll see is people complaining that the
concept of CIDR is an evil value judgement, because you need
to decide what
aggregation to do in order to keep the routing table a
manageable size.

I already have my complaints about CIDR. It is NOT the same and let's not go
there right now.

Now - I'll *readily* agree that "ICANN versus new.net" is political,
and probably worth discussing. However, I'm going to have to start
putting Bozo Flags on people who *still* claim that RFC2826
is political
just because it points out that Things Will Provably Break if you have
conflicting roots.

It doesn't say what you think. Do a logical analysis of the docuemnt after
removing all pre-judgements. The document is not self-standing. This is the
first clue that it is a political document. Granted, some of the issues are
that of word-smithing, but that is even more clue that it shouldn't be taken
as "gospel".

If you look at is from the perspective of a system designer/architect, you
will see the holes readily. If you perform a permutations analysis, you will
see that they've walled-off many branches for no good reason (possibly,
convenience). A good design includes all the permutations of all parts of
the requirements matrix. Including, implied requirements that aren't stated.
A robust design doesn't include arbitrary limitations.

Umm... actually, we showed *THAT* can happen when we first had more than
one server for '.' and had to propogate the root from place to place.

Two roots that are synchronized are essentially one root. We already
know how to have lots of registries feed into a common view of the root.
The problem starts when one root knows about .com, .net, and .foo, and
another knows about .com, .net, and .bar, and a third has .com, .net,
and a conflicting view of a different .foo.

Now, how did SRS deal with the first root having an SOA for blat.foo that
pointed at an NS entry at 128.154.0.1, and the third root had an SOA
for blat.foo that pointed at a different NS entry run by a different
company at 119.5.254.9? Guess what? you get different answers based
on which root you ask. And I'd be vastly surprised if SRS could tell
us how to get consistent results from the two roots in this case.