Hi Bruno,

> 
> First off, link identifiers are a sore spot.  Mistakes were made. However, we 
> have, after many tweaks, achieved interoperability in the field.
>  
> We are now just trying to formally document how to extend this into the 
> MP-TLV space. We do not want to upset the delicate balance of existing 
> implementations.
>  
> By documenting this as a ’SHOULD’, we encourage all implementations along a 
> certain direction without discrediting interoperable implementations that do 
> not 
> precisely follow the letter of the spec. Please understand that as soon as we 
> say ‘MUST’, it becomes a highly competitive issue and someone’s sales team 
> uses it as a lever to bash someone else’s sales team.  If, in fact, things 
> are interoperable, there is no practical problem. Why pick a fight when we 
> don’t have to?
>  
> [Bruno] There _is_ an interop issue. I believe Les has acknowledged this. “we 
> are at risk that some implementation which does not support Link IDs would 
> not be able to correctly match the two TLVs. I think this is a valid point 
> and I will modify the draft to address this.”
> https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/lsr/qRiLP_XqhQqmTKWtM4B2EIPPAyM/


I believe that Les has already addressed this issue in -05.


> As for sales team speech, I sympathize but I can’t change sale teams behavior 
> (at my level I try to keep them honest, but I’m afraid that money seems a 
> bigger incentive). Plus it seems like sales teams would have a much bigger 
> lever by saying that an implementation not supporting the knob to disable the 
> sending of MP-TLV creates a risk for the network. So I’m not sure that the 
> “SHOULD” path is that much safer.


The “SHOULD” path completely disarms the sales team abuse. Again, everyone 
should already want to interoperate.  That’s why we’re all here.


> I understand the vendor position to protect the pre-standard implementation. 
> But I’m in the network operator position and I’m trying to make the network 
> as safe as possible. We’ll see what position the IETF will take.


You do not make the network safer by mandate.  You make it safer by writing 
more forgiving code.


> More philosophically, interoperability occurs because all parties see the 
> benefits of mutual interoperability, not because of the wording of the spec.  
> We are not lawmakers and there is no enforcement mechanism.  It behooves us 
> to write specs that gently encourage everyone to be interoperable. Despite 
> recent musing by the IAB, Postel’s law is still the best way forward.
>  
> [Bruno] RFC 2119 defines keywords for a reason. (to indicate Requirement 
> Levels).


Yes, clarity of intent. None of it has the power of law.

T


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