Re: in support of axfr-clarify

["D. J. Bernstein" <djb@cr.yp.to>]

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Kevin Darcy writes:
> You're only reinforcing the need for a Clarify draft.

I've been saying for years that the DNS specifications are horribly
inadequate. I thought axfr-clarify sounded like a great idea until I
read the document and discovered twelve problems. Two of those problems
have now been fixed; ten more to go.

> an implicit assumption -- that non-Answer sections of an AXFR response
> would never be used productively -- which turned out to be false
> because of things like EDNS0 and TSIG.

These issues have been discussed before. First, contrary to your claim,
there is no evidence of an actual problem. Second, and more importantly,
if an optional protocol extension fails to ensure compatibility with the
previous protocol, that is entirely the extension's fault.

As I wrote when we last discussed this in July 2001, after you asked why
I wasn't changing my code:

   The benefits are nonexistent. The harms include encouraging further
   disregard for compatibility. What stops incompetent implementors from
   demanding another code change every week? Ignore AXFR AR, discard
   TKEY, ignore types 128-255, recognize IXFR, ignore MS garbage. This
   is not a sane way to handle optional protocol extensions.

Is compatibility such a difficult concept to grasp?

---D. J. Bernstein, Associate Professor, Department of Mathematics,
Statistics, and Computer Science, University of Illinois at Chicago



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