Subject: FYI: DMTF investigating SLP

From: Matt Peterson <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 26 Feb 2001 11:15:52 -0700

I was notified a few weeks ago of interesting discussions taking place
on the DMTF about the use of SLP.  The DMTF (www.dmtf.org) is the
industry organization that is leading the development, adoption and
unification of management standards and initiatives for desktop,
enterprise and Internet environments.  There is a very good chance your
company is a member of this organization as it has very strong support
from a very long list of companies: Microsoft, HP, Sun, Intel, IBM,
Cisco, and many more (see http://www.dmtf.org/db/list/company.php3 for
complete list).

It looks as though the DMTF will be successful in defining a set of
interoperability management standards that will be used by many
different companies to build compatible management software.  In their
current design there is an obvious need and unaddressed need to
recommend a standard for the location of services.  I am not a DMTF
expert, but it looks like SLP is exactly what they are looking for.  

Representatives from Microsoft (and others), seem show a lack of
understanding of important aspects of service location and they appear
to be pushing other non-IETF standards.  Sun, Caldera, and others are
supporting the use of SLP as an interoperable protocol for service
discovery, while the majority of DMTF members are undecided due to lack
of information or misunderstanding of the fundamental requirements for
service location.  

Please take a moment see if your company is a member of the DMTF and if
possible become involved in the discussions that are defining their
service discovery standards.  If you have the time wish to become
involved, you can sign up as a member using the following form:
http://www.dmtf.org/db/forms/access.  You will probably want to
subscribe at least to [email-masked] which is currently discussing
SLP.

This is a great opportunity for SLP to shine at solving the problem it
was designed to solve.  Let's help the DMTF make a good decision by
recommending the use of SLP where it is appropriate.

-- 
Matthew Peterson
Sr. Software Engineer
Caldera Systems, Inc
[email-masked]

---

From: Mark Bakke <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 26 Feb 2001 12:56:21 -0600

Hi-

I am working on the Naming & Discovery team for the iSCSI
(SCSI over TCP) protocol, within the IP Storage (IPS) working group.
We came across SLP in our search for a method of locating SCSI
targets (devices) on an IP network.  I have submitted an internet
draft presenting a few SLP templates for finding iSCSI devices,
which will be discussing during the March IETF meeting.

I subscribed to this list a few weeks ago.  I just read Matt
Peterson's email about encouraging the DMTF to use SLP; in
the same spirit, I am trying to encourage the iSCSI protocol
to do the same.

If anyone on this list is interested, the draft is now
available at:

http://www.haifa.il.ibm.com/satran/ips/draft-bakke-iscsi-slp-00.txt

To understand some of the concepts behind iSCSI targets, and
their naming schemes, the following documents may also help.

iSCSI

http://www.haifa.il.ibm.com/satran/ips/draft-ietf-ips-iSCSI-04.txt

iSCSI Naming & Discovery

http://www.haifa.il.ibm.com/satran/ips/draft-ietf-ips-iSCSI-name-disc-00.txt

URN format for iSCSI world-wide unique identifiers

http://www.haifa.il.ibm.com/satran/ips/draft-bakke-iscsi-wwui-urn-00.txt

I am not an expert on SLP, but have read the drafts and the enterprise
book.  I would appreciate any comments on the appropriateness of our
use of SLP, as well as any ideas on how to make it better.

Regards,

-- 
Mark A. Bakke
Cisco Systems
[email-masked]
763.398.1054