[ppml] Proposed Policy: 4-Byte AS Number Policy Proposal

[Geoff Huston]

At 09:36 AM 13/12/2005, Rich Emmings wrote:
>A possible addition is for space to be left aside in the proposal for 
>private 4 byte AS numbers, perhaps:
>
>   1) in the same range as the 2 byte range, i.e. 64512 - 65534:x or
>   2) in each range (x:64512 - 65534)


While I have heard of folk indicating that the private IPv4 address space 
is too small, I have not heard of anyone saying that the 1023 AS numbers 
reserved for private use is too small. If there is a broad perception that 
the space is too small then we'd either need to go down the path of a 
global policy to reserve additional space or possibly head down the IETF 
Standards track document path. Both represent significantly greater 
thresholds than this relatively simple policy proposal. I'd suggest that 
expansion of the private AS number space be considered as a separate topic 
and the merits or otherwise of such a proposal be considered without tying 
it up with this transition policy.



>Notes: a) not sure the status of AS23456 with regard to this, if any.


as23456 is reserved for use as a transition AS in 
draft-ietf-idr-as4bytes-12.txt - no further RIR action is required 
regarding this particular AS number.


>         b) administrative ease is addressed here by using the same range, 
> at the possible expense of "c"
>         c) efficiency of allocation is not -- could be with a small range 
> at the top, at the expense of "b"


it is unclear to me what your point is here.



>In addition, documention-only ASN's may be of use, ala the IPv4 addresses in
>RFC3330.  While the private range can be used, in BGP documentation, as with
>others, it's harder to determine 'public' from 'private' when only private
>space is used.

Again, this may well benefit from being a distinct policy proposal.

regards,

    Geoff