An Overview of Reliable Server Pooling Protocols
draft-ietf-rserpool-overview-06

[Ballot comment]
Section 4.2 says:

  Since the application data (e.g. data channel) is managed by the
  RSerPool framework, unsent data (data not yet submitted by
  RSerPool to the underlying transport protocol) is automatically
  redirected to the newly selected pool element upon failover.  If
  the underlying transport layer supports retrieval of unsent data
  (as in SCTP), retrieved unsent data can also be automatically re-
  sent to the newly selected pool element.

This model seems simplistic. Depending on what your application
semantics are, you may want one of the following:
- resending data that has not been *received* by the server yet
- resending data that has not been committed to stable storage by the
  server yet
- resending information requests that have not been answered yet
- resending state-affecting requests that came after latest state
  cookie was received

Perhaps this is something that you can deal with using the callbacks
that the document talks about later. However, its not entirely clear
to me that the specified default behaviour of sending unsent data
is very useful.

This is a just a comment. You may or may not want to deal with this.
I'm fine with the documents going forward as-is, given that they
are experimental.

RFC 4858 Writeup for Rserpool Overview

(1.a)  Who is the Document Shepherd for this document?  Has the
          Document Shepherd personally reviewed this version of the
          document and, in particular, does he or she believe this
          version is ready for forwarding to the IESG for publication?

No Document Shepherd has been appointed for this document, the
Working Group Chairs are taking responsibility for reviewing and
Forwarding the document.

  (1.b)  Has the document had adequate review both from key WG members
          and from key non-WG members?  Does the Document Shepherd have
          any concerns about the depth or breadth of the reviews that
          have been performed?

The document has been reviewed by key WG members.

We have had a number of outside reviews, most especially detailed review of the document by Scott Bradner.

  (1.c)  Does the Document Shepherd have concerns that the document
          needs more review from a particular or broader perspective,
          e.g., security, operational complexity, someone familiar with
          AAA, internationalization, or XML?

No concerns that we know of.

  (1.d)  Does the Document Shepherd have any specific concerns or
          issues with this document that the Responsible Area Director
          and/or the IESG should be aware of?  For example, perhaps he
          or she is uncomfortable with certain parts of the document, or
          has concerns whether there really is a need for it.  In any
          event, if the WG has discussed those issues and has indicated
          that it still wishes to advance the document, detail those
          concerns here.  Has an IPR disclosure related to this document
          been filed?  If so, please include a reference to the
          disclosure and summarize the WG discussion and conclusion on
          this issue.

There are no IPR filings on the document.

  (1.e)  How solid is the WG consensus behind this document?  Does it
          represent the strong concurrence of a few individuals, with
          others being silent, or does the WG as a whole understand and
          agree with it?

There is strong WG consensus on the document.

  (1.f)  Has anyone threatened an appeal or otherwise indicated extreme
          discontent?  If so, please summarize the areas of conflict in
          separate email messages to the Responsible Area Director.  (It
          should be in a separate email because this questionnaire is
          entered into the ID Tracker.)

No one has threatened an appeal or otherwise objected.

  (1.g)  Has the Document Shepherd personally verified that the
          document satisfies all ID nits?  (See
          http://www.ietf.org/ID-Checklist.html and
          http://tools.ietf.org/tools/idnits/.)  Boilerplate checks are
          not enough; this check needs to be thorough.  Has the document
          met all formal review criteria it needs to, such as the MIB
          Doctor, media type, and URI type reviews?  If the document
          does not already indicate its intended status at the top of
          the first page, please indicate the intended status here.

Nit checker has been run on the document successfully.  This draft is informational only.

  (1.h)  Has the document split its references into normative and
          informative?  Are there normative references to documents that
          are not ready for advancement or are otherwise in an unclear
          state?  If such normative references exist, what is the
          strategy for their completion?  Are there normative references
          that are downward references, as described in [RFC3967]?  If
          so, list these downward references to support the Area
          Director in the Last Call procedure for them [RFC3967].

Yes, references are split as required. 

  (1.i)  Has the Document Shepherd verified that the document's IANA
          Considerations section exists and is consistent with the body
          of the document?  If the document specifies protocol
          extensions, are reservations requested in appropriate IANA
          registries?  Are the IANA registries clearly identified?  If
          the document creates a new registry, does it define the
          proposed initial contents of the registry and an allocation
          procedure for future registrations?  Does it suggest a
          reasonable name for the new registry?  See [RFC2434].  If the
          document describes an Expert Review process, has the Document
          Shepherd conferred with the Responsible Area Director so that
          the IESG can appoint the needed Expert during IESG Evaluation?

There are no IANA considerations required for this draft. 

  (1.j)  Has the Document Shepherd verified that sections of the
          document that are written in a formal language, such as XML
          code, BNF rules, MIB definitions, etc., validate correctly in
          an automated checker?

There are no sections written in a formal language.

  (1.k)  The IESG approval announcement includes a Document
          Announcement Write-Up.  Please provide such a Document
          Announcement Write-Up.  Recent examples can be found in the
          "Action" announcements for approved documents.  The approval
          announcement contains the following sections:

Technical Summary

This draft provides a high level overview of the Rserpool protocols.

Working Group Summary

The Working Group process was constrained by the relatively small number of people actively involved (although those involved were committed to doing implementations of the protocols).  Otherwise there was little controversy within the group.

Document Quality

There are multiple implementations of both ENRP and ASAP protocols, thanks to participants.  However, there are no vendors that have indicated plans for implementation.  Based on this and the limited number of participants, Experimental track seems appropriate.  We received detailed comments and review from Scott Bradner and his help was greatly appreciated.

Personnel

Document Shepherding is being provided by the Working Group chairs, Maureen Stillman and Lyndon Ong.  Responsible Area Director is Magnus Westerland.