[802.15_GENERAL] [New-work] WG Review: Recharter of Network Configuration (netconf)
IEEE 802 WG Chairs,
The following new work announcement from the IETF may be of interest to
your WG members.
Paul Congdon
________________________________
From: The IESG
[mailto:iesg-secretary@ietf.org]
Sent: Thu 11/8/2007 7:05 AM
To: new-work@ietf.org
Subject: [New-work] WG Review: Recharter of Network Configuration
(netconf)
A modified charter has been submitted for the Network Configuration
(netconf) working group in the Operations and Management Area of the
IETF.
The IESG has not made any determination as yet. The modified
charter is
provided below for informational purposes only. Please send your
comments
to the IESG mailing list (iesg@ietf.org) by November 15, 2007.
Network Configuration (netconf)
================================
Current Status: Active Working Group
Chair(s): TBD
Operations and Management Area Director(s):
Dan Romascanu <dromasca@avaya.com>
Ronald Bonica <rbonica@juniper.net>
Operations and Management Area Advisor:
Dan Romascanu <dromasca@avaya.com>
Technical Advisor(s):
Wesley Hardaker <hardaker@tislabs.com>
Mailing Lists:
General Discussion: netconf@ops.ietf.org To Subscribe:
netconf-request@ops.ietf.org In Body: in msg body: subscribe
Archive:
https://ops.ietf.org/lists/netconf
Description of Working Group:
Wes Hardaker is Technical Advisor for Security Matters
Configuration of networks of devices has become a critical
requirement
for operators in today's highly interoperable networks. Operators
from
large to small have developed their own mechanisms or used vendor
specific mechanisms to transfer configuration data to and from a
device,
and for examining device state information which may impact the
configuration. Each of these mechanisms may be different in various
aspects, such as session establishment, user authentication,
configuration data exchange, and error responses.
The NETCONF Working Group is chartered to produce a protocol
suitable
for network configuration, with the following characteristics:
- Provides retrieval mechanisms which can differentiate between
configuration data and non-configuration data
- Is extensible enough that vendors will provide access to all
configuration data on the device using a single protocol
- Has a programmatic interface (avoids screen scraping and
formatting-related changes between releases)
- Uses a textual data representation, that can be easily
manipulated
using non-specialized text manipulation tools.
- Supports integration with existing user authentication methods
- Supports integration with existing configuration database systems
- Supports network wide configuration transactions (with features
such
as locking and rollback capability)
- Is as transport-independent as possible
- Provides the following support for asynchronous notifications:
- Specify the <hello> message (capability exchange) details to
support
notifications.
- Specify the application mapping details to support notifications.
- Specify the protocol syntax and semantics of a notification
message.
- Specify or select a notification content information model.
- Specify a mechanism for controlling the delivery (turn on/off) of
notifications during a session.
- Specify a mechanism for selectively receiving a configurable subset
of
all possible notification types.
The NETCONF protocol will use XML for data encoding purposes,
because
XML is a widely deployed standard which is supported by a large
number
of applications. XML also supports hierarchical data
structures.
The NETCONF protocol should be independent of the data definition
language and data models used to describe configuration and state
data.
However, the authorization model used in the protocol is dependent
on
the data model. Although these issues must be fully addressed to
develop
standard data models, only a small part of this work will be
initially
addressed. This group will specify requirements for standard data
models
in order to fully support the NETCONF protocol, such as:
- identification of principals, such as user names or distinguished
names
- mechanism to distinguish configuration from non-configuration
data
- XML namespace conventions
- XML usage guidelines
It should be possible to transport the NETCONF protocol using
several
different protocols. The group will select at least one suitable
transport mechanism, and define a mapping for the selected
protocol(s).
The initial work (has completed) and was restricted to the
following
items:
- NETCONF Protocol Specification, which defines the operational
model,
protocol operations, transaction model, data model requirements,
security requirements, and transport layer requirements.
- NETCONF over SSH Specification: Implementation Mandatory; NETCONF
over
BEEP Specification: Implementation Optional; NETCONF over SOAP
Specification: Implementation Optional; These documents define how
the
NETCONF protocol is used with each transport protocol selected by
the
working group, and how it meets the security and transport layer
requirements of the NETCONF Protocol Specification.
Additional Notification work (as described above) will now be
addressed
since the initial work has been completed.
An individual submission Internet Draft has been proposed to the WG
as
the starting point for the Notification work. The WG shall adopt
the
document identified as 'draft-chisholm-NETCONF-event-01.txt' as the
starting point for this work.
A second phase of incremental development of NETCONF will include
the
following items:
1. Fine-grain locking: The base NETCONF protocol only provides a
lock
for the entire configuration datastore, which is not deemed to meet
important operational and security requirements. The NETCONF
working
group will produce a standards-track RFC specifying a mechanism for
fine-grain locking of the NETCONF configuration datastore.
(The initial draft will be based on
draft-lengyel-ngo-partial-lock-00.txt barring additional
contributions
from the community.)
2. NETCONF monitoring: It is considered best practice for IETF
working
groups to include management of their protocols within the scope of
the
solution they are providing. NETCONF does not provide this
capability.
The NETCONF working group will produce a standards-track RFC with
mechanisms allowing NETCONF itself to be used to monitor some aspects
of
NETCONF operation.
(The initial draft will be based on
draft-chisholm-netconf-monitoring-00.txt barring additional
contributions from the community.)
3. Schema advertisement: Currently the NETCONF protocol is able to
advertise which protocol features are supported on a particular
netconf-capable device. However, there is currently no way to
discover
which XML Schema are supported on the device. The NETCONF working
group
will produce a standards-track RFC with mechanisms making this
discovery
possible.
This item may be merged with "NETCONF monitoring" into a
single
document.
(The initial draft will be based on
draft-scott-netconf-schema-query-00.txt barring additional
contributions
from the community.)
4. NETCONF over TLS - based on implementation experience there is a
need
for a standards track document to define NETCONF over TLS as an
optional
transport for NETCONF
(The initial draft will be based on
draft-badra-tls-netconf-04.txt barring additional contributions from
the
community.)
The following are currently not considered in scope for re-chartering
at
this time, but may be candidates for work when there is community
consensus to take them on. Individual submissions are being
encouraged.
o Access Control requirements
o General improvements to the base protocol o NETCONF access to
SMI-based MIB data o The Bill Fenner problem: Address real or
perceived
issue that "giving SSH for NETCONF gives full SSH access to the
box"
Goals and Milestones:
Done Working Group formed
Done Submit initial NETCONF Protocol draft
Done Submit initial NETCONF over (transport-TBD) draft
Done Begin Working Group Last Call for the NETCONF Protocol draft
Done Begin Working Group Last Call for the NETCONF over
(transport-TBD) draft
Done Submit final version of the NETCONF Protocol draft to the IESG
Done Submit final version of the NETCONF over SOAP draft to the
IESG
Done Submit final version of the NETCONF over BEEP draft to the
IESG
Done Submit final version of the NETCONF over SSH draft to the IESG
Done Update charter Done Submit first version of NETCONF
Notifications
document
Done Begin WGLC of NETCONF Notifications document
Dec 2006 Submit final version of NETCONF Notifications document to
IESG
for consideration as Proposed Standard
December 2007 -00 draft for NETCONF Monitoring December 2007 -00
draft
for Schema Advertisement
December 2007 -00 draft for Fine Grain Locking
December 2007 -00 draft for NETCONF over TLS
March 2008 - Early Review of client authentication approach (for
NETCONF
over TLS) with the security community at IETF 71
August 2008 - WG Last Call on NETCONF Monitoring after IETF72
August 2008 - WG Last Call on Schema Advertisement after IETF72
August 2008 - WG Last Call on Fine Grain Locking after IETF72
August 2008 - WG Last Call on NETCONF over TLS after IETF72
October 2008 Send four documents to the IESG for consideration as
proposed standards
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