Subject: [Roll] Last Call: <draft-ietf-roll-trickle-05.txt> (The Trickle Algorithm) to Proposed Standard

From: The IESG <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 22 Nov 2010 08:35:12 -0800

The IESG has received a request from the Routing Over Low power and Lossy
networks WG (roll) to consider the following document:
- 'The Trickle Algorithm'
  <draft-ietf-roll-trickle-05.txt> as a Proposed Standard

The IESG plans to make a decision in the next few weeks, and solicits
final comments on this action. Please send substantive comments to the
[email-masked] mailing lists by 2010-12-06. Exceptionally, comments may be
sent to [email-masked] instead. In either case, please retain the
beginning of the Subject line to allow automated sorting.

The file can be obtained via
http://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-ietf-roll-trickle/

IESG discussion can be tracked via
http://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-ietf-roll-trickle/

No IPR declarations have been submitted directly on this I-D.

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From: Ulrich Herberg <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 23 Nov 2010 11:05:43 +0100

Hi,

I have reviewed the document and think that it is in a good shape to
be published. Just some nits that I found:

- headers of section 6.1 to 6.7.: Should be in capital letters,
similar to sections 4.1/4.2 and 10.1./10.2
- introduction: "current implementations use 4-11 bytes...". I wonder
whether that is wise to put into the draft, since it once it will be
published, "current" implementations may need more or less (at that
future time)
- introduction, 2nd paragraph: "Section Section 6.8" (remove one "Section")
- section 6: "It is RECOMMENDED that a protocol [...] include
mechanisms" (s/include/includes/)
- Acknowledgments: thanks for having included me in that list; my
first name is written Ulrich, not Urlich :-)
- References: There is an informative ref to an individual draft by J.
Hui. Is that a problem in a std. tracks document to cite an individual
draft? Couldn't that delay the publication process?

Regards
Ulrich

On Mon, Nov 22, 2010 at 5:35 PM, The IESG <[email-masked]> wrote:
> _______________________________________________
> Roll mailing list
> [email-masked]
> https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/roll

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From: "Colin O'Flynn" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 23 Nov 2010 10:16:24 -0000

Hi Ulrich,

> published, "current" implementations may need more or less (at that

I think it is reasonable to keep such a statement. It could be simplified to
just explain what those bytes are, but I think the point is if you pick up
the draft you know right away what sort of resource requirements the draft
carries.

So something saying "Trickle requires at minimum three variables". The size
of the variables would depend on your network & processor architecture. Such
a statement would remain valid even when we move to 128-bit processors & a
single variable is typically 16 bytes ;-)

Regards,

  -Colin

-----Original Message-----
From: [email-masked] [mailto:[email-masked]] On Behalf Of
Ulrich Herberg
Sent: November 23, 2010 10:06 AM
To: [email-masked]
Subject: Re: [Roll] Last Call: <draft-ietf-roll-trickle-05.txt> (The Trickle
Algorithm) to Proposed Standard

Hi,

Regards
Ulrich

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From: Ulrich Herberg <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 23 Nov 2010 11:27:00 +0100

Colin,

> single variable is typically 16 bytes ;-)

Yes, I can agree to that.

Ulrich

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From: Philip Levis <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2010 11:09:54 -0800

> Yes, I can agree to that.

Hm -- let me explain the reasoning for why the text says "4-11 bytes" rather than "x variables." Basically, bytes is more precise. Even if an architecture has 16-byte words (I guess by "typical variable" you mean "C int type"), there are still one-byte and two-byte variables. If you care about data size, you can use these smaller types, and that's what leads to having 4-11 bytes.

Saying "three variables" could mean "3 large arrays" or "3 bytes." It doesn't provide a lot of insight. I could implement Trickle with a single long long, where I pack things like c, t, and the current interval size into those 8 bytes. "Variables" isn't really a statement of the resource requirements, while the number of bytes can be. 

Does that make sense?

Phil