[arin-ppml] Ending point to point links as a justification for a /30?

[Joe Maimon]

William Herrin wrote:
>  On Wed, Jul 28, 2010 at 5:21 AM, Joe Maimon <jmaimon at chl.com> wrote:
> > William Herrin wrote:
> >> I don't think we even give 'em point to point links. For the last
> >> /8 the vendors can damn well fix their code to originate ICMP
> >> from the loop0 address instead of the RFC1918 address on the
> >> interface.
> >
> > I completely agree. That feature would be really lovely along with
> > other control plane traffic handling improvements and wider
> > availability of proper address abstraction off of the physical
> > interface.
>
>  How much support would there be for a policy proposal to exclude
>  point to point links as a justification for any global IP addresses
>  effective, say, 1/1/2012? Along with a stern recommendation from
>  ARIN to the routing vendors that they update their software to
>  prevent the non-availability of of addresses for point to point links
>  from causing malfunctions with ICMP warnings and errors?

I agree with your technical assessment. It is unnecessary and simply 
prevails currently as the path of least resistance due to vendors and 
operators inability to expend the extra effort to properly abstract 
address endpoints used in communication off of the physical interfaces 
used to route them.

 From expensive firewalls that cannot accept dial up vpn on a loopback 
to cheap CPE which cannot even do unnumbered serial, the list of who to 
blame is endless and covers all areas. ICMP generation is simply the 
excuse which sounds the most legitimate, as it will tend to cause 
violation of a common interpretation of  standards. Monitoring and 
visibility also rank up there. However, these can all be worked around, 
if the desire to do exists.

That ARIN should be explicitly restricting what is justified use other 
than generally basing acceptable justification activities that conform 
to prevailing normative practices is an idea I am not quite comfortable 
with. The reward would need to be worth the risk. I know of one specific 
utilization singled out, that of name based virtual hosting, but has 
there been any others?

Is it wise to continue to craft policy that engages and addresses 
specific behaviors? I would have to be overwhelmingly convinced on a 
case by case basis.

How much influence can ARIN actually expect to have on vendors and 
operators, either by advocacy or by policy? I suspect the answer is far 
less than we might hope.

Joe