Session Date/Time: 18 Mar 2025 06:00

nfsv4

Summary

This NFSv4 meeting covered several key topics including the status of current RFCs, a discussion on the maintenance and future of NFSv4.0, the security document, the 5661 BIS document, and erasure coding. A significant portion of the meeting was dedicated to discussing the challenges of maintaining and evolving NFSv4 in a way that balances the needs of existing implementations with the desire for new features and improvements.

Key Discussion Points

NFSv4.0 Deprecation/Obsolescence: There was an extensive discussion on whether to deprecate or obsolete NFSv4.0. The main concern is that a formal deprecation could negatively impact existing implementations, even if the group has no plans to work on the protocol. It was agreed that a charter modification clarifying the working group's focus might be a better approach. The upcoming internationalization work triggered the discussion of how to proceed.
Security Document: A status update was provided on the security document. The chair expressed a desire to see progress on this front, particularly in incorporating TLS as a supported transport security mechanism alongside Kerberos. The plan to move the Novak security document into Markdown and GitHub is still underway. It was stated that a document detailing how security is handled in the layers below NFSv4 would be helpful to the IESG.
5661 BIS Document: Brian provided an update on the 5661 BIS document, which aims to update the core 4.1 specification. The goal is to clean up the document, removing inline discussion and consolidating changes, and to move it into version control (GitHub). The complexities of doing a BIS on a base specification with extensions was discussed.
Erasure Coding: Tom presented on the challenges of erasure coding, particularly in the context of data consistency during write operations and power failures. The limitations of existing kernel-based servers and the need for a new paradigm that focuses on chunks rather than blocks were discussed. The suggestion was made to define wire semantics instead of focusing on data server implementation.
Versioning Scheme: The current versioning scheme for NFSv4 (4.0, 4.1, 4.2) was criticized for being confusing and inconsistent. A need to streamline the versioning and extension process was discussed.

Decisions and Action Items

Charter Modification: The chairs will draft a charter modification to clarify the working group's focus, potentially addressing concerns about continued maintenance of NFSv4.0 and older versions.
5661 BIS Document Cleanup and Version Control: Brian will create a plan and timeline for cleaning up the 5661 BIS document, factoring out change lists, and moving it to GitHub for version control. A second editor will be identified to assist with the workload.
Security Document Progress: Chris will continue work on the security document, including the move to Markdown and GitHub.
Erasure Coding Wire Semantics: Tom will continue work on erasure coding with a focus on clarifying the network/wire semantics.

Next Steps

The chairs will circulate a draft charter modification for review and discussion.
Brian will share the plan and timeline for the 5661 BIS document cleanup and move to GitHub.
Continued discussion on the mailing list to resolve outstanding issues and address the challenges of evolving NFSv4.
Brian will work with Chris to setup version control for the 5661 BIS document.