Kai,

Thanks for continuing the discussion. I¹ll summarize what I think you are
proposing; please correct me if I misunderstood you.

First, I think you would prefer that an ALTO server offer a single
update-stream resource, which handles updates for all resources, rather than
allowing a server to define N different update stream resources, each of
which handles a different subset of resources.

I think most servers will provide a single update-stream resource. I think
that is the simplest approach, and I would be happy to recommend that. But I
do not think we should require that. For one thing, we haven¹t done that for
other services. E.g., suppose a server provides ECS for 4 cost types. A
server can offer one ECS resource for all 4 cost types, and most servers
will do that. But we did not require that; a server can offer 4 different
ECS resources, with one cost type each, if the server wants.

Also, suppose an ALTO server has two different network maps: one is public,
and available to everyone, while the other is private, and only available to
authorized users. The private network map & cost maps use https and require
a client certificate. In this case the server needs two separate update
stream resources: a public one for updates to the public maps, and a private
one, which also requires a client certificate, for updates to the private
maps.

I believe your other suggestion is that a client should be able add or
remove resources for an existing stream. Eg, suppose a client creates an
update stream and initially requests updates for the network map and
routingcost, but not hopcount. I believe you would like to allow a client to
be able to add hopcount updates  to that existing stream at some later time,
without having to close the stream and create a new one.

II agree that is a logical extension. But it does complicate the protocol,
and I cannot think of a reason why a client would actually want to do that.
Can you come up with a use case where that helps?

- Wendy Roome

From:  EXT Gao Kai <[email protected]>
Date:  Thu, March 10, 2016 at 05:37
To:  Wendy Roome <[email protected]>, <[email protected]>
Subject:  Re: [alto] State of the WG

Here is how I think of pushing updates for multiple resources in one stream
and also explains why I'm not comfortable with the current design.

1. Can multiple resources be put in one stream?
Yes -> 2
NO -> I can live with this.  But as Wendy suggested, we still want to make
it easier for clients to handle dependencies.

2. Can arbitrary resources be put in one stream?
Yes/NO -> 3
NO -> What's the principle here then?  At the moment dependency (not
necessarily the binding of network map and cost map but it's the only
dependency defined by now) is the only principle that makes sense.

3. Do we allow closing a subset of resources in a stream?
Yes -> 4
NO -> I can live with this.

4. Can a client add resources to a stream then?
Yes -> That's what I prefer because if we support closing a subset, it seems
reasonable and natural to have the symmetric operation.  But we might have
to extend the protocol.
NO -> That's where we are and it really doesn't make any sense to me.

Regards,
Kai


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