Re: [802SEC] Help on our scope work
See my notes below:
Matthew Sherman, Ph.D.
Engineering Fellow
BAE Systems - Electronics, Intelligence, & Support (EI&S)
Office: +1 973.633.6344
Cell: +1 973.229.9520
email: matthew.sherman@baesystems.com
-----Original Message-----
From: ***** IEEE 802 Executive Committee List ***** [mailto:STDS-802-SEC@ieee.org] On Behalf Of J Lemon
Sent: Thursday, July 23, 2009 1:53 PM
To: STDS-802-SEC@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG
Subject: Re: [802SEC] Help on our scope work
Adding my initials, JL.
Apparently, the red and italic print didn't even stand up to a single
pass through the EC reflector so it's a good thing that you delimited
the text. My comments are delimited with my initials, PAT.
-----Original Message-----
From: ***** IEEE 802 Executive Committee List *****
[mailto:STDS-802-SEC@ieee.org] On Behalf Of Geoff Thompson
Sent: Wednesday, July 22, 2009 10:25 AM
To: STDS-802-SEC@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG
Subject: Re: [802SEC] Help on our scope work
Tony/Colleagues-
That being the case (at least in your opinion and mine) let's put the
text forth here for consideration. If we can't agree on it as our scope
statement (and I doubt that as a group we can) then we can at least pick
it apart and see what elements of it we can agree upon.
So, I'll take an initial crack at this thus:
But first, an annotation style note. I have made my notes red/italic in
style but I have my doubts that styling will survive multiple passes
through the EC reflector. Therefore I have delimited my comments (in a
manner extensible to other commenters) with
{GOT> comment text }
MJS - To clarify thins I added dashed lines between sections being commented.
=======================
IEEE 802 refers to a family of IEEE standards dealing with local area
networks and metropolitan area networks.
/{GOT> Actually, I think the use of "geographic" terminology in our
scope is now out of date. We now span the range from "Personal Areas" to
networks that span the furthest reaches of our planet. Further, while
not specifically addressed by the scope of any of our Working Groups,
our technology is used or at least closely related to both satellite and
deep space communication. We may be better served by concentrating our
802 scope statement on what is discussed in the next paragraph. In the
midst of all of this, I am not suggesting a change in any of the titles
traditionally used for our groups.}
/{JL> I certainly wouldn't mind if we altered LAN/MAN to something more
inclusive, especially since it does lead some to infer a geographic
scope to our work. But I agree that it is not as important as the actual
scope. And, perhaps once we nail down our scope, a corrected name of the
group will be more obvious.}
/(MJS> To me what is key is that we formed under the computer society. Traditionally we were about computer to computer communications. Recently we have expanded our wings to address cellular / voice communications as a subset of data communications in general. So perhaps after this first line place "IEEE 802, also known as the LAN/MAN Standards Committee, formed under the IEEE computer society to address computer to computer communications. They have since expanded their scope to address data communications in general, including 4G and other networks.")
-----------------------------------
More specifically, the IEEE 802 standards are restricted to networks
carrying variable-size packets.
/{GOT> I believe "variable size packets" is the key differentiator,
especially when contrasted with circuit switched networks and cell networks}
/(MJS> I sort of disagree with this. We carry voice traffic today as part of a mix of traffic, but nothing restricts someone to carrying a single size of data packets on the network. I would reword this to "Unlike traditional cellular (isochronous) networks, IEEE 802 standards allow networks to utilize variable-sized packets.)
-----------------------------------
(By contrast, in cell-based networks data is transmitted in short,
uniformly sized units called cells. Isochronous networks, where data is
transmitted as a steady stream of octets, or groups of octets, at
regular time intervals, are also out of the scope of this standard.)
/{GOT> I also agree with this statement. We don't do synchronous
networks. We may use links that are synchronous at the physical layer
but we do not carry that synchronicity across the upper layers for any
of the MAC to MAC connectivity that we use to build our networks}/
/{PAT> I like variable size packet networks and think they are the way to
go, but strictly speaking, I don't think one can say that isochronous
has been totally out of scope since 802 has one (unsuccessful) standard
that supported an isochronous service in addition to variable best
effort packets (802.9). Perhaps "focused on" rather than "restricted
to". Or perhaps given the lack of success in 802.9, our scope going
forward should keep us out of isochronous in the future.}
/(MJS) I mostly agree with Pat and would reword this too "(By contrast, in cell-based or isochronous networks data is transmitted in regularly spaced uniformly sized units, often called cells, and which are often quite short compared to packets used in IEEE 802 standards. Isochronous networks are not typically implemented with IEEE 802 standards.)")
-------------------------------------
The number 802 was simply the next free number IEEE could assign, though
"802" is sometimes associated with the date the first meeting was held
--- February 1980.
/{GOT> We should conclusively resolve the facts behind this urban legend
before everybody who knows anything about it is dead. The "next in
sequence" theory should be relatively easy to resolve. Assuming we do
not get torpedoed by the IEEE-SA records retention policy, we should be
able to look back through the minutes of NESCOM and the SASB minutes of
the day and see what the assignments were for the other projects at the
time.}/
{PAT> I don't particularly care if we resolve this - it seems a pretty
harmless area for legends, but for grins I checked IEEE Xplore to see
what occupied the adjacent numbers. It is pretty clear from that that
the numbers have not always been given out in order. The first one
before 802 is 800-1953 and I know that 488 had its first standard some
time in the early 70's (though Xplore doesn't have that version). The
700's only have 26 of the 100 numbers taken - either there are a lot of
PARs that never produced a standard or never had their old
withdrawn/archived standard imported into Explore or 802 wasn't the
first empty number. However, most of the items in the 700's have their
first document dated in the late 70's or in the 80's so it does look
like 802 was used somewhat in sequence. 803 has an 803-1983 - faster
than a typical power standard if they got their PAR in 1980. 804, 805,
and 806 are all from the 1950's and 1960's and they and 800 are all
related to aircraft so!
it looks like at one time IEEE was using the 800's for that topic but
they skipped 802.}
{JL> I'm pretty sure that the numbers are not always handed out strictly
in sequence and have been allocated based on the significance of the
number. For example, I believe that 1394 and 1494 were purposely chosen
to match with the xx94 of 1294.}
(MJS> Actually I research this once may years ago when someone had told me 802 was named after the hotel room of the first IEEE 802 Chair. I actually found a College report written on IEEE 802 that reported this as fact (true Urban Legend)! I'd like to include some text on this and clarify that it wasn't the case - although did it happen by accident that it was the hotel room of the first chair at the first meeting?)
(MJS> Also at one time I belonged to 'local 802' which happens to be the NY chapter of the American Federation of Musicians. I've always found that an interesting coincidence, though obviously there is no actual relationship.)
---------------------------------
The services and protocols specified in IEEE 802 map to the lower two
layers (Data Link and Physical) of the seven-layer OSI networking
reference model. In fact, IEEE 802 splits the OSI Data Link Layer into
two sub-layers named Logical Link Control (LLC) and Media Access Control
(MAC) , so that the layers can be listed like this:
- Data link layer
-LLC Sublayer
-MAC Sublayer
- Physical layer
/{GOT> I agree with this statement. I think we can use it with minimal
alteration.
I would delete the text "In fact," from the 2nd sentence.
At the end of the 2nd sentence I suggest changing "so that the layers
can be listed like this:" to "thus the layering can be described as:"}/
/{GOT> Then after the layering text description I would add something
like "Individual Working Groups may have further sub-layering
descriptions within each of their own standards.}/
{PAT> that looks pretty good with the changes you suggest. LLC is what
is above the MAC at the Layer 2 end points - in the bridges, it is the
relay with an increasing set of shim sublayers. I don't know if we
should say something about that.}
{JL>I think we should explicitly show the bridge layer(s).}
/(MJS> actually the current title of 802.1 is "Higher Layer LAN Protocols Working Group." This is particularly important to me at the moment since I'm contemplating a couple of PARs that would involve interfaces to the Higher Layers. I may need to conduct that work in IEEE 802.1 and it would not be bridging related...)
--------------------------
IEEE 802.23 Broadband ISDN system
/(MJS> We have to drop this line! Really we might want to add a whole subsection title 'History of IEEE 802' and really go at it.)
=======================
Further comments welcome.
Best regards to all,
Geoff
On 7/22/09 8:14 AM, Tony Jeffree wrote:
>> That's actually pretty accurate.
>>
>> Regards,
>> Tony
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: ***** IEEE 802 Executive Committee List *****
[mailto:STDS-802-SEC@ieee.org] On
>> Behalf Of Geoff Thompson
>> Sent: 22 July 2009 04:51
>> To: STDS-802-SEC@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG
>> Subject: [802SEC] Help on our scope work
>>
>> Colleagues-
>>
>> Yeah, I know you can't depend on the accuracy of Wikipedia for anything
>> but...
>>
>> Take a look at:
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEEE_802
>>
>> Their description may be better than anything we came up with. It is at
>> least worthy of consideration in our discussions
>>
>> Geoff
>>
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