Re: [ietf-provreg] registries, XML & EPP (again)

[Klaus Malorny <Klaus.Malorny@knipp.de>]

Edward Lewis wrote:

> 
> No reason to be sorry for that feeling.  But the question is - in what 
> way did the discouragement of the ccTLDs become a self-fulfilling prophecy?
> 
> (One disclaimer - I am going to label camps as ccTLD and gTLD.  Take 
> this as a broad brush.  In particular, my current employer is both a 
> ccTLD and a gTLD.  The camps aren't so neatly distinct.)
> 
> As one of the chairs of the group, I did my best to get wide review. (I 
> was hampered by a limited budget for this as my then employer is not any 
> kind of a stakeholder in the process.)  Approaching some ccTLDs when I 
> could get out, I was told that input was too expensive. The only 
> organizations that expended energy were those with a gTLD mission.
> 
> It wasn't until I got one ccTLD person to speak up about the host-less 
> issue that the specification softened on this.  It wasn't a matter of 
> getting a voice of a ccTLD to do this, it was a matter of trying to 
> figure out what middle ground was available, i.e., how to bend the work 
> to suit all comers.  There were rumors floating that the host-less 
> approach was in conflict with EPP, but until someone clearly said why 
> and was able to sketch a solution, rumors were just that.  (Engineers 
> don't deal in rumor.)
> 
> When the WG began in 2001, nearly all of the voices were gTLD fed. 
> ccTLDs didn't pay much attention as the first blocks of concrete set. 
> Over time EPP got wider review which translates into rethinking early 
> decisions.  Any feelings of "let's not do this again" by the incumbents 
> towards the newcomers is just human nature.  It will continue to be this 
> way until the Internet serves the entire planet. Such inertia needs to 
> be fought, with even more energy by the newer newcomers or else the 
> entire effort will collapse into fragmented bickering.
> 
> My words aren't about "anyone vs. the Verisign model," although I can 
> understand that sentiment.  This is about trying to make the IETF work.
> 
> What can be done?  If you were to submit a draft that gives engineering 
> details of what is wrong with EPP for your case, perhaps there is a way 
> to define EPP2 that is even more general.   Then again, maybe not - TV 
> has PAL and NTSC formats.  The people that "suffer" are those running 
> the clients.
> 

Hi Edward,

I cannot say who's fault it is. I think I have brought up some valid reasons 
for an existing registry with a proprietary structure not being interested in 
EPP. Beyond that, I can only speculate, like that they didn't want to 
participate because of the major role of Verisign. To get the real causes, you 
have to ask the registries themselves. In addition, I don't know what efforts 
the heads of the WG made to integrate the ccTLDs into the development process.

Anyhow, in my personal retrospective, my question is whether the goal of EPP is 
an illusion. To be honest, I have not a big insight in the thinking of the 
ccTLDs, but I think they have their reasons for not wanting to become a 
"generic" registry, distiguishable from other registries only by the TLD label. 
However, the goal of a protocol is to unify, to harmonize, to narrow things to 
the essence. The "Extensible" in EPP is from that point of view already a 
contradiction. If it is not limited to extensions also defined by the IETF, it 
gives freedom to the registries on the one hand, but destroys the benefits of 
the protocol on the other hand. Please don't misunderstand me, I do not want to 
devaluate Scott's and all others' work (well, execpt for the wrong statement 
about idempotency...), and EPP as it is has definitely its positive sides, but 
my conclusion is that the final goal cannot be reached. Therefore I am not a 
big proponent of the EPP idea.

As you asked, what can be done, there are indeed areas which I would like to 
have more extensibility or extensiblity at all:

- the command types, as mentioned
- the error codes
- the contact roles in domains
- the status values of contacts, hosts and domains

But taking into account what I have said above, the question is whether an EPP2 
(instead of an EPP1.x that just fixes problems that have been discussed 
recently) really makes sense. And of course, one can solve the 
non-extensibility of these elements by the current extension mechanism.

regards,

Klaus


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