Subject: Re: (ION) ILMI-Based Server Discovery

From: Tim Salo <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 10 Nov 1998 16:10:51 -0600 (CST)

> To: Tim Salo <[email-masked]>
> cc: [email-masked], [email-masked]
> Subject: Re: (ION) ILMI-Based Server Discovery 
> Date: Mon, 09 Nov 1998 12:13:21 -0800
> From: Mike Davison <[email-masked]>
> Sender: [email-masked]
> 	[...]
> As to how server discovery will allow a diskless host to learn it's ip
> address, there are several ways. A few are:
> 
>     o  Use server discovery to locate a mars then broadcast a dhcp 
>        request using mars,
> 	[...]

I think using ILMI to learn the address of one or more servers is useful.
However, I have some concerns about using MARS to find a DHCP server.

My primary concern is that while using a broadcast service (either native
or emulated) to find a server may make sense in a local-area network, it
probably doesn't make sense in a wide-area network.  I think we should
re-affirm the long-standing IETF strategy of developing protocols for
wide-area networks and then applying them in local environments, (numerous
counter-examples notwithstanding).

I am also concerned that the IETF solution for IP broadcast over NBMA
networks has not found market acceptance.  The last time I wanted to
buy a MARS server, I was unable to find any commercial product.

Does anyone know of any commercial ATM products that provide a MARS
server?

-tjs

[Gratuitous whining section]

(Using a emulated broadcast function on NBMA networks to support IP
protocols that require a link-level broadcast is what I sometimes
call the "make everything look like an Ethernet" strategy.)

((This is supposed to be the _Internet_ Engineering Task Force, not the
LAN Engineering Task Force...))
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