IPPM

IETF 125 IPPM & BMWG Joint Session Minutes

Date: Thursday, March 27, 2025 (IETF 125 Shenzhen)
Chairs: Marcus Ihlar (IPPM), Giuseppe Fioccola (IPPM/BMWG), Tommy Pauly (IPPM - not presiding), NH Chen (BMWG)
Secretary: Stuart Cheshire

Summary

The IPPM and BMWG working groups held their third joint session to discuss overlapping themes in network performance measurement and benchmarking. The session covered updates on active working group documents, including STAMP extensions, IOAM integrity, and alternate marking deployment. Several new benchmarking proposals for AI fabrics, SAVNET, and Route Origin Validation (ROV) were presented. The session concluded with a strategic discussion regarding the future of the joint sessions and potential re-chartering or merging of the two working groups.

Key Discussion Points

1. Working Group Status and Administration

Liaisons: A liaison from ITU-T Study Group 13 regarding SRv6 and Quality of Outcome was discussed. The community successfully integrated feedback via the mailing list, which was noted as an exemplary model of inter-organizational communication.
Joint Adoption Call: A joint adoption call is underway with the MPLS working group for "MPLS on-path telemetry network action flag for OAM" due to its relevance to IPPM/BMWG telemetry work.
BMWG Updates: draft-ietf-bmwg-mlrsearch is in the RFC Editor queue. The BMWG YANG model and SR benchmarking methodology recently passed Working Group Last Call (WGLC).

2. Active Working Group Documents

IOAM Integrity YANG: A YANG Data Model for In Situ Operations, Administration, and Maintenance (IOAM) Integrity Protected Options
- Justin Iurman presented draft-ietf-ippm-ioam-integrity-yang. The draft is currently in WGLC.
- Mohamed Boucadair noted that the base IOAM integrity document is awaiting IESG review and urged for more reviews of the YANG model to keep them as a cluster.
STAMP CoS Extension for ECN: Update of the STAMP CoS Extension for ECN
- Shaoping Cheng and Greg White presented draft-ietf-ippm-stamp-cos-ecn.
- Discussion focused on choosing between the current TLV (backward compatible) and a proposed "CoS V2" TLV (self-contained but breaks compatibility). Interoperability testing is planned for the IETF 126 Hackathon.
Power Benchmarking: Updates to Characterization and Benchmarking Methodology for Power in Networking Devices
- Shailesh Srivastava provided updates on the recently adopted draft-ietf-bmwg-power-benchmarking.
- The document now includes "stabilization" and "averaging" intervals for measurements and aligns with the GREEN working group. Carsten Rossenhoevel suggested adding a section on test tools.
STAMP IP Header Reflection: STAMP Extensions for Reflecting STAMP Packet IP Headers
- Rakesh Gandhi presented draft-ietf-ippm-stamp-ext-hdr.
- The draft was updated based on implementation feedback from William Hawkins. The authors requested WGLC.
Alternate Marking and On-Path Telemetry: AltMark and On-Path Telemetry drafts
- Giuseppe Fioccola requested WGLC for draft-ietf-ippm-alt-mark-deployment, draft-ietf-ippm-alt-mark-yang, draft-ietf-ippm-on-path-telemetry-yang, and draft-ietf-ippm-on-path-active-measurements.

3. Proposed New Work and Individual Drafts

AI Fabric Benchmarking: Benchmarking for AI fabrics (terminology - training - inference)
- Fernando Oliveira proposed three new documents for AI workload benchmarking.
- Carsten Rossenhoevel questioned the domain-specificity (RoCEv2) and the high barrier to entry for testing labs requiring large GPU clusters. Discussion on whether these should be generalized or remain AI-specific was moved to the list.
STAMP Bit Error Rate (BER): Simple Two-Way Active Measurement Protocol (STAMP) Extensions for Residual Bit Error Rate Measurement
- Rakesh Gandhi proposed measuring residual bit errors using STAMP padding.
- Discussion involved the probability of bit errors in padding vs. headers and the practical limits of CPU-based vs. hardware-based processing for high-bandwidth backbone links.
IP Measurement Options: IP measurement options; Enabling passive network measurements with minimal additional data and efforts.
- Jared Lenz presented a hybrid measurement method for railway systems. Greg Mirsky noted that per RFC 7799, modifying packets makes this a hybrid method, not passive.

4. Strategic Discussion: Joint Working Group Session Feedback

Chen Wu presented Feedback on IPPMBMWG Joint Session, summarizing opinions on merging the working groups.
Concerns: Reduced focus on existing work, time constraints for specific topics, and distinct scopes (Lab vs. Production).
Benefits: Long-term efficiency, shared review pool, and better coordination with other SDOs.
Participant Feedback:
- Greg Mirsky expressed skepticism, stating that the groups still appear isolated in their technical focus and cross-pollination isn't happening naturally.
- Dan Voyer suggested that the issue might be the small size of the communities rather than the charter structure itself.
- Marcus Ihlar noted that the joint experiment would continue with improvements to session scheduling.

Decisions and Action Items

Decisions:
- The Working Group Last Call for draft-ietf-ippm-ioam-integrity-yang will be extended if necessary to ensure sufficient review.
Action Items:
- Stuart Cheshire to update draft-ietf-ippm-responsiveness to address aggressive connection issues and buffering.
- Authors of STAMP CoS ECN to seek list consensus on the TLV version (V1 vs V2).
- Chairs to initiate WGLC for the suite of Alternate Marking and On-Path Telemetry documents following the meeting.
- Authors of AI Fabric drafts and Carsten Rossenhoevel to continue the scope discussion on the mailing list.

Next Steps

Interoperability testing for several STAMP extensions is planned for the IETF 126 Hackathon.
The chairs will facilitate a dedicated chartering discussion regarding the potential merging or continued joint operation of IPPM and BMWG.
Call for adoption will be considered for the STAMP BER and SAVNET benchmarking drafts based on list feedback.

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