in defense of lisp (was: Anybody can participate in the IETF)

Cameron Byrne cb.list6 at gmail.com
Wed Jul 13 03:41:42 UTC 2011


On Jul 12, 2011 5:21 PM, "Randy Bush" <randy at psg.com> wrote:
>
> > W.R.T. to LISP,  in defense of the IETF or the IRTF, i do not believe
> > "the IETF" has told the world that LISP is the best fit for the
> > Internet or solves any specific problem well.
> >
> > The IETF has never said the "Internet Architecture" is going to LISP,
> > and it likely will not / cannot.  My expectation is that LISP will go
> > away as quickly as it came.
>
> i will not dispute this, not my point.  but i have to respect dino and
> the lisp fanboys (and, yes, they are all boys) for actually *doing*
> something after 30 years of loc/id blah blah blah (as did hip).  putting
> their, well dino's, code where their mouths were and going way out on a
> limb.
>

Understood. But watch for similarities between 6to4 and LISP. Both are
clever, both have great intentions, both are extremely dangerous once people
start thinking this is anything beyond a toy.  And when lowly plebeians like
myself hear that research folks at iij and Facebook are doing "something"
with LISP, we think that is a blessing of this technology. But, after the
"fan boy" chatter dies down, you hear that this is not actually support,
it's just engineers doing "Dino" a favor.

I admittedly have dismissed LISP early on and do not understand its merits ,
the idea of ip in ip tunnels as the new internet architecture gives me
indigestion.  I am also concerned about  the questionable business case of
why edge networks would make investments to bail out DFZ providers (the main
point of LISP).  If ipv6 was a hard sell, I can't even imagine making LISP
get traction. If the economics are not right, it will never fly, and the
economics of LISP are all wrong. Please, spare me line about how LISP is
just a knob I turn and has no cost.

I fear that at its worst and most successful, LISP ensures ipv4 is the
backbone transport media to the detriment of ipv6 and at its best, it is a
distraction for folks that need to be making ipv6 work, for real.

Cb

PS. I think the research guys should give more time to ILNP and creating a
graceful unwind of ipv4 and NAT.  The dividends from ipv6 only start to
really pay when ipv4 becomes optional. My 2 cents, and no more.

> i am *not* saying i would run it in an operational network.  but maz-san
> and i were happy to help the experiment by dropping the first asian node
> in a test rack on the public net.
>
> randy



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