Brian E Carpenter wrote:
The harm is generic harm to innovation and applications architecture.
That is a theoretical harm, or rather an opinion of such. It is not supported by the widespread use of IPv4 NAT. In fact the ubiquity of IPv4 NAT is proof that such criticisms are baseless. Perhaps more importantly, in the past the IETF required RFC candidates to have working implementations before being approved. IPv6 has no working implementation because, in large part, it does not include a NAT standard.
The prime example today is the grotesque things that VoIP protocol designers have been forced to do.
Pure FUD. SIP is the issue here, not VOIP. SIP is a badly designed protocol in many ways, not just for its embedding of network layer addresses as authentication. VOIP protocols such as IAX have no issues with NAT because they learned the lessons of history, not by layering workarounds on top of workarounds. No honest criticism of NAT can fail to note these details and yet we continue to read these vague and general criticism because... well, because either 1) NAT critics cannot make a defensible point, 2) they do not understand the issues with SIP, or 3) they stand to profit by prolonging the IPv4 address shortage.
Mainly because the problems are totally undiagnosable, especially for the typical home user/help desk combination. And should we really be pushing technology that we know to be unreliable? As an engineer, that's actually a violation of my professional ethics.
As an engineer you should know how to implement logging in such a way that permits monitoring of your own networks. Some very large NAT'd networks have no such logging issues. Once again, statements of opinion, offered as fact, as those noted above, vague and unsupportable. Roger Marquis _______________________________________________ nat66 mailing list [email protected] https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/nat66
