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North American Network Operators Group Date Prev | Date Next | Date Index | Thread Index | Author Index | Historical Re: FIBER CUT: Dallas to West Coast
On Thu, 30 August 2001, Patrick Greenwell wrote: > > I don't know what the goal of "basement dual-homers" is. I think that > > is the other thread, which I haven't been keeping up with. > > My point was simply that the "basement dual-homers" probably want the same > thing as the "people that matter", which is disparate paths to the > Internet. Maybe Bill Gates' or C. Michael Armstrong's homes have dual-entrance cable vaults, but I suspect most basement dual-homers don't have disparate paths to the Internet nor or really looking for that level of reliability. How many people choose a second voice long distance company for their homes? So what do basement dual-homers really want? Most folks seem to be trying to protect themselves from the business practices of their provider, not necessarily the physical problems. Are we solving the wrong problem precisely? > Except for the small problem that there is no guarantee that DNS servers > will honor TTLs, that this solution would necessitate dialing down > TTLs to the lowest possible value to maximize effectiveness which would > greatly increase DNS-related traffic, and flapping could be really ugly. > > DNS in lieu of a routing protocol make me uncomfortable. Necessity is the mother of invention. Problems are rarely solved before there is critical need to solve them. Should we be trying to use IP addresses as permanent identifies, or names? If it became a critical issue, would programmers start/best practice using the second, third, etc IP address returned in the DNS query? If a SYN fails, should the IP stack flush the DNS cache entry and check for a fresh IP address? I agree, using DNS in lieu of routing makes me uncomfortable. However, we also need to remember the reliable "service" we are creating is really at Layer 8. There may be a need for some smarter middle-ware (I hate that term) which spackles over some of the bumps and gaps. IP emulates a reliable network over an unreliable infrastructure. Do we also need an App/IP layerto emulate reliable services over an unreliable IP network? I would rather add a new floor on top, than trying to jack up the foundation and change the basement.
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