shim6 @ NANOG (forwarded note from John Payne)

Tue Feb 28 16:52:25 UTC 2006

On Feb 28, 2006, at 10:28 AM, Joe Abley wrote:

>
>
> On 28-Feb-2006, at 11:09, Kevin Day wrote:
>
>> Some problems/issues that are solved by current IPv4 TE practices  
>> that we are currently using, that we can't do easily in Shim6:
>
> Just to be clear, are you speaking from the perspective of an  
> access provider, or of an enterprise?
>

In my case, we'd be best described as "content provider".  As in:

Our primary business does not include providing access to others
We multihome extensively, and have multiple POPs scattered around
If it weren't for some branching out into unrelated areas, we  
wouldn't have qualified for IPv6 PI space, and most others like us  
wouldn't at all.

I mean nothing but respect for the work you guys have put into shim6.  
I realize there are significant problems in scaling the current  
architecture much higher. My only objection really is this line of  
thinking:

If you're not huge(providing access to hundreds of networks, or can  
demonstrate a huge number of devices), you're not getting PI space.
If you don't get PI space, you're not going to announce your PA space  
anywhere, your ISP's announcement of their /32 handles that for you.
If you're using PA space and you want to multihome, shim6 is how  
you're going to do it.

I'm not saying shim6 is flawed beyond anyone being able to use it. I  
can see many scenarios where it would work great. However, I'm really  
wary of it becoming the de facto standard for how *everyone*  
multihomes if they're under a certain size. I'm just bringing up my  
objections now, so that it's really clear that shim6 doesn't provide  
what a lot of us smaller networks are doing now in IPv4 land.

-- Kevin