Global BGP community values?

Tue Oct 5 08:32:02 UTC 1999

At 01:16 05/10/99 -0700, Vadim Antonov wrote:
>Yes, i agree (actually, the BGP with metrics per that document
>is compatible with currently deployed BGP) - but isn't it better
>to provide a real fix and get rid of several kludges at once?

I agree but then why didn't your draft make it to BCP or experimental RFC
status?  Perhaps if we do the community thing and demonstrate that there is
a real world benefit, then we can revive your RFC draft and integrate the
knowledge we gain into something that gets accepted and implemented a bit
later on.

-Hank

>
>--vadim
>
>To: Vadim Antonov <avg at kotovnik.com>, nanog at merit.edu
>From: Hank Nussbacher <hank at ibm.net.il>
>Subject: Re: Global BGP community values?
>
>At 23:39 04/10/99 -0700, Vadim Antonov wrote:
>
>The difference is your proposal requires changes to the BGP protocol (new
>optional transitive attribute), whereas mine piggybacks on the existing
>community attribute - thereby being able to be implemented tomorrow as
>opposed to some months/years from now.
>
>-Hank
>
>>
>>I proposed real metrics for BGP long time ago.  Back then
>>the idea didn't find any support -- apparently few people
>>felt it was needed.
>>
>>The mechanism described in the draft is stragightforward and significantly
>>more powerful than the community attribute usage proposed by Hank - and
>>also can do everything MED and LOCAL_PREF can do, so these can
>>be retired.
>>
>>Here's the URL:  http://www.civd.com/~avg
>>
>>--vadim
>>
>>--------------------------------------------------
>>Hank Nussbacher <hank at ibm.net.il> wrote:
>>
>>I think everyone at one point or another has tried to influence incoming
>>data flows via BGP. About the only tool available to influence the BGP
>>decisions in far away places is via AS-PATH length.  This turns out to be
>>a fairly never-ending iterative process - that at best achieves 80% of its
>>intention. It also doesn't allow for accurate decision making.  As an
>>alternative, neighboring ISPs and their customers usually design some BGP
>>community system which is then used to influence the BGP decision process.
>>
>>Why can't this be extended globally [if this has already been done and
>>written up in some BCP RFC - just point it out to me]?  What if we all
>>agreed that if some community value of say 1000000-2000000 [example] is
>>seen, then those community values are to take precedence above all other
>>metrics.  1000001 could mean - "this is the best path for me - always send
>>pkts this way no matter what the other metrics might say".  We could build
>>up a table of these global community strings.  ISPs that don't use it - no
>>harm done.  But the more ISPs (tier 1 & 2) that do use it - the better the
>>end customer and ISPs have on influencing data flow.
>>
>>Comments welcome.
>>
>>Hank Nussbacher
>>
>>
>
>