Pushing vs. Pulling

[Edward Lewis <lewis@tislabs.com>]

Speaking as the WG chairs, we'd like to make a few comments about the
push-pull debate.

First, we believe that this debate is one for the ages, not in grandure,
but in persistence.  (And, frankly, the issue is rather small when compared
to the scope of the problem.)  We hope that once the group comes to a
conclusion, members of the group can put this in the past and move on.
With the natural divide in the issue, it will make some folks seem like
winners and other seem like losers over this issue - but winning and losing
isn't important when it comes to engineering.  Engineering is about getting
the job done (and done right is possible).  (Yay, rah-rah, go team go, and
all that.)

There is a consensus in the group that the group wants one protocol.  We
take this to mean that a registrar doing business with two different
registries wants to use just one set of software.  Please allow me to delve
into a somewhat arbitrarily concrete example.  Let's say I want to register
names in .com and .biz.  Would I expect to be running a (software) client
from each, or should one client be sufficient.  As it seems the group's
desire, it would seem to me to have just one client.  (Our question: is
this a good assumption?)

Now, the chairs realize that this is the IETF and organizations don't count
for much, and that we are to be looking beyond the registration of domain
names.  But we want to determine if there should be a latent assumption of
any client software should speak full EPP (or whatever) in order to speak
with all registries.

The chairs don't want to make a technical decision on behalf of the group.
(Not that we feel we are being compelled to do so at this time.)  It seems
that there is no clear winner amongst "pull" and "push" technically -
although some folks have strong opinions.  (No clear winner = no clear
consensus.)  But to state the WG problem - the group needs to decide and to
do so in a timely manner.

It is clear that there are strong preferences for one or the other,
understandably so.  But, to the strong proponents of one or the other,
let's move away from trying to prove "'my' way is right" to some try to
find middle ground.  (Perhaps this can't be done, but let's give it a go.)

BTW, the Push-Pull straw poll did have one benefit.  Scott suggested that
polling is a MUST, pushing a MAY.  Perhaps this is the middle ground to
build upon.  (Comments on this, please.)

Other than that, there is nothing significant in the poll results (some
wanted one, some wanted the other).

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=--=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Edward Lewis                                                NAI Labs
Phone: +1 443-259-2352                      Email: lewis@tislabs.com

You fly too often when ... the airport taxi is on speed-dial.

Opinions expressed are property of my evil twin, not my employer.