[ppml] IP Address Management Tools

[Ian Baker]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: <Michael.Dillon at radianz.com>
To: <ppml at arin.net>
Sent: Tuesday, August 19, 2003 10:08 AM
Subject: RE: [ppml] IP Address Management Tools


<snip>

> I really did not intend my request to open the door for mindless vendors
> flogging their wares.

I think you might need to take a deep breath, there (although I understand
your comment)

> I suggest that ARIN should provide such a tool in furtherance of
> its purposes such as numbers 4, 5 and 8. You can read the full
> text of those numbered purposes at this URL:
> http://www.arin.net/library/corp_docs/amend_june_19_1997.pdf
>
> I would like to see a discussion of this on the agenda at the
> next members meeting.
>
> I envisage this tool as something which uses a proper
> hierarchical data model for IP addresse, not a
> relational data model, and which uses an appropriate
> programming language which could be incorporated into
> commercial software packages or adopted by enterprise IT
> departments. That probably means a Java framework
> combined with Python for scripting glue.
> http://www.jython.org

Hmm. Call me a meddling software guy, but mandating a particular technology
over stipulating a thorough design is usually the recipe for a failed
project.

I would suggest that you might be better off getting together with a couple
of designers and programmers and sorting the algorithms and metadata first
(on first glance both fairly trivial tasks, given the crudity of the
database model).

A reference implemntation - in my personal view - is only useful once you
have defined *external* interfaces, so that people aren't necessarily stuck
with a single bit of technology that may or may not fall by the wayside just
when the system itself is being adopted.

At any rate, that's the sort of successful project work that I've seen over
the years.

I can think off-hand of several billion-dollar failures caused by picking a
technology and then trying to bend the design to fit.

Regards,

Ian