The place where the future of the Internet is created

A week has passed since my second trip to the IETF, my thoughts and emotions have calmed down a bit, and I decided to share my impressions about the IETF.

What is the IETF?

A bit of history. Many people know that at the dawn of the Internet, there was an ARPAnet network that united networks of universities in the United States. But only a few people know that ARPAnet was far from being the only prototype network - at that time DecNET, IPX / Netware, SNA, etc. existed simultaneously with ARPAnet. These were incompatible networks, each of which was a “thing in itself”. However, over time, all these networks were absorbed by ARPAnet, the principal difference of which was the openness of data transmission standards and abstraction from the internal structure of different networks. This led to the emergence of a modern model of the Internet network of networks or networks of autonomous systems. Along with the rapid growth in the number of autonomous systems, openness was not enough - quality, extensibility and maintaining backward compatibility became important. It was these principles of improving open standards that led to the IETF (Internet Engineering Task Force) in 1986.

Initially, the IETF was organized with the support of the US government, but in 1993 it was transformed into an international public organization in association with the Internet Society. The IETF has found a very radical solution to the problem of independence from manufacturers, regulators and jurisdictions - the IETF, as a legal entity. face does not exist. Totally. Those. there is an IETF Secretariat that performs administrative functions - supporting the site and the mailing system, holding conferences, but the activities of the participants themselves remain “volunteer,” and neither the leaders of the groups nor the curators of the IETF salaries receive.
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How do standards appear?

The path of any standard begins with an idea that is then clothed in a formal description. Thus, it turns out a draft of the new standard (draft). After that, the draft is sent for consideration and revision to the working group in charge of this topic. If the working group does not exist, and the number of stakeholders is more than one, there is an opportunity to create a new working group. In case the working group decides on the successful completion of the draft, it is sent to the IESG for verification by the direction curators. After completing this phase, IANA will extract the required values ​​(if required) - and here it is, a ready-made standard (RFC). You can read more in the RFC , which describes how to create an RFC.

Over the 30 years of its existence, several thousand standards have been developed within the IETF, but even more proposals have been “frozen” in the draft state, i.e. not approved by the community. Anyway, it is the IETF that can be praised / blamed for the appearance of such hits as BGPv4, IPv6, BCP38 and the two versions of the pigeon mail delivery protocol (see here and here ).

Why do I need to participate in the IETF?

In my opinion, there are at least two reasons for this:

• First, not all IETF members are people from the industry today, but their activities directly affect the work of the industry today-tomorrow-the day after tomorrow. Therefore, if you do not want to see undesirable changes in your favorite protocol or a new version of IPvXXX - participate.
• Secondly, you can offer a solution to some technical problem and make this proposal become a new standard, and the world as a result is a little better. For example, Qrator Labs is currently engaged in the IETF with the issue of creating protection against Route Leak in BGP. This is not to say that it is simple, and all the more quickly, but the road will be mastered by walking.

Separately, it is worth mentioning the popularization efforts that the IETF is conducting in conjunction with the ISOC. The Internet Society Fellowship to IETF program provides an opportunity to receive a participation-flight-living grant, provided you explain your motivation. In my opinion, this provides a unique opportunity for students, graduate students and researchers.

How to get started in the IETF?

To get started is to subscribe to the newsletter groups of interest to you. Most groups make decisions in the mailing list. There are also IETF conferences where the presentation of new / updated draft takes place. Conferences are held 3 times a year, in the summer in Europe, in the autumn in Asia and in the spring in the Western Hemisphere. Reports are held in 8-10 parallel streams, so you will not be able to visit all of you with all the desire. However, in most cases, this does not create problems — just as it is almost impossible to be simultaneously a high-class specialist in biology, chemistry, and physics, it is also impossible to cover several areas at the same time that work is being done within the framework of the IETF.

What can go wrong?

The simplest thing is that with your opinion most of the participants turn out to be disagree. Here we need to understand that the goal of any discussion within the IETF is consensus. Therefore, the dispute will not be in the form of an anonymous voting for / against, but in the form of a reasoned discussion. The IETF is a place where people still believe in sophistry. Therefore, the worst that can happen is if your suggestions / comments are not criticized, but ignored. Those. you write a document, participate in a session - and you seem not to be noticed. This usually means that you have crossed the permissible border somewhere and spoiled your “karma”. For example, you have appropriated someone else's idea, or they are starting to suspect you of lobbying the interests of a certain vendor.

To address such and not only conflict situations, there are leaders of working groups (WG chairs) who coordinate the work of narrowly focused working groups, and Area Directors leading certain areas. In case of “unsolvable” problems, these people will try to help you overcome them.

Total:

If you try to summarize - the IETF is not a place for tactical decisions, the IETF is a place for creating a long-term technical strategy for the Internet, and if you make long-term plans, you cannot afford to ignore what is happening in the IETF.