Subject: AIW 10 Minutes

From: [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 19 Apr 96 11:34:11 EST

APPN IMPLEMENTERS WORKSHOP (AIW) 10 HIGHLIGHTS

This report is to capture the overall activities and summarize
the accomplishments of AIW 10.  You can find detailed minutes on
the mail exploders of the various SIG, RIG, and BOF groups, or on
the AIW Home Page http://www.raleigh.ibm.com/app/aiwhome.htm.

OVERVIEW
========

AIW 10 was held from March 25-28, 1996 at the San Jose Hilton and
Towers in San Jose, CA.  There were approximately 80 attendees
representing 18 different organizations or individuals.  The
purpose of the meeting was to continue cooperative work on the
Advanced Peer-to-Peer Networking (APPN) architecture and related
technologies and implementations.

APPN is an open architecture that extends the capabilities of
IBM's Systems Network Architecture (SNA) to provide dynamic but
predictable, reliable and cost-efficient peer-to-peer networking.

The purpose of the APPN Implementers' Workshop (AIW) is to
facilitate the availability of fully-interoperable, high quality
APPN products from a wide variety of vendors.  The AIW serves as
a forum for members to share information about APPN, its
implementations and customer experiences; to help one another
with implementation problems; to develop any necessary
enhancements; and to promote the use of APPN.

TUTORIALS
=========

The following tutorials were presented:

     APPN Introductory Tutorial    -    Marcia Peters, IBM
     Frame Relay Tutorial          -    Gene Cox, IBM
     What a Simulation User Needs to Know
                                   -    Peter Williams, Williams
                                        Network Analysis, Ltd
     HPR Intro/Intermediate        -    Ray Bird, IBM
     Session Services Extensions   -    Candy Elder, IBM
     Border Node Tutorial          -    Roy Brabson, IBM

Attendee feedback shows that the tutorials were generally well
received.

SIG/RIG/BOF WORKING SESSIONS:
=============================

--  APPN and HPR MIBs SIG  --

The MIBs SIG, chaired by Paul Golick of IBM, made the APPN
Management Information Base (MIB) ready for the final level of
AIW approval - Closed Pages (CP).  The SIG did further work on
redefinition of the HPR MIB and requested an Amended Approved
Direction status.  The plenary later ratified both these status
change requests.  Additionally the SIG shared some of the time
with the SNA NAU MIB RIG (most participants are involved in both
groups).  The MIB SIGers worked all day and late into the night
on Monday, and deserve commendations for their hard work and long
hours.  Thanks, folks!

--  Reference SIG  --

Gary Schultz (IBM) did a fine job when he filled in for Ralph
Case as Reference SIG Chair at this AIW.  Ralph had a good excuse
for his absence; he was busy giving support to his wife Joan as
she delivered their new son, Connor Benjamin Case on Wednesday,
March 27th.  Connor weighed in at 10 lb 1.5 oz and we hear that
both Baby and Mom are doing fine.  Congratulations Ralph and
Joan!

Topics discussed at the Reference SIG included planned
availability of the SNA formats books, review of recently changed
status items and fixes, MIB SIG work report, DLUR items, CV40
management information usage, TRS clarifications, proposals on
how to get VTAM PU/LU names to type 2.0 nodes, a vendor-specific
additions proposal, and an initial proposal for a DLUR extension.

--  Border Node SIG  --

Chuck Brotman filled in as SIG Chair for Ed Tremblay, who was
unable to attend this AIW due to illness.  After a review of the
Border Node SIG's charter and work schedule the group embarked on a
page-by-page review of the Extended Border Node (EBN) document.
The latest version of the document, which had been submitted for
Approved Direction review, contained SSE prerequisite changes, and
new sections dealing with the cross-subnet functions.

The first part of the review, led by Candy Elder (IBM), covered
through chapter 3, which had been previously reviewed and updated,
and there were various questions, discussions, and clarifications
made.  The second part of the review, led by Marcia Peters (IBM),
dealt primarily with the newly added cross-subnet functions.

The review was temporarily put on hold while the group discussed
an apparent misunderstanding about whether or not the Border Node
document was to include HPR function.  The consensus of the group
was that the HPR Border Node is a requirement.  Further, it was
agreed that to minimize schedule impact on the EBN document, HPR
Border node need not be in the first release.

After more technical review and discussion, the SIG came to a
close with a recommendation of Approved Direction for the
existing document.  This was later ratified by the AIW Plenary.

Another important milestone!  Good job folks!

--  HPR/ATM SIG  --

The HPR SIG, chaired by Marcia Peters, made good progress.  After
covering some minor HPR architecture updates, the group focused
on a discussion of LLC2 formats for HPR over frame relay.  Jim
Cobban, of Nortel, proposed a SAP multiplexing tower and there
was consensus for approval from the group.  Approval will be done
electronically after Ray Bird updates the architecture with Jim's
proposal and electronic consensus is obtained.

The group then reviewed the latest version (ATM03) of the HPR/ATM
draft specification, led by IBM's Gary Dudley, the creator and
editor of this submission.  There was much fruitful discussion on
this topic, including another SAP multiplexing discussion, again
led by Jim Cobban, this time in the ATM context.  Through good
joint work by the members, some refinements to the base ideas
surfaced and there again was consensus to continue with this
work.  The entire HPR/ATM document is slated for electronic AP
approval, pending Jim's writeup of his new submission and its
incorporation into ATM03.

--  Validation BOF  --

Erika Lewis, IBM, led the discussions in the Validation BOF.
Topics included the Multi-Vendor Connectivity test (MVCT) and the
choices involved in trying to provide for "at home" multi-vendor
multi-site testing of APPN via some existing networking
infrastructure.  The group agreed that one MVCT per year was
adequate and that more work was needed before the member companies
could evaluate the cost vs. usefulness of the multi-site
"experimental network" approach.

--  DLSw RIG  --

DLSw minutes from this AIW were not available at the time of this
writing.  Please look to the DLSw mail exploder for the future
publishing of the AIW 10 DLSw minutes.

--   CPI-C RIG  --

The CPI-C RIG (A.K.A. CIW) met and chair John C Broughton III
(IBM) led the discussion on distributed security using DCE, APPC
architecture updates, and distributed directory.

PLENARIES
=========

--  Industry Perspectives  --

Nortel's Tony Rybczynski and Jim Cobban gave a marketing and
technical view of the networking arena as seen by Nortel.

Mr. Rybczynski's talk on carrier networks focused on ATM and the
market and competitive space.  As the Director of Strategic
Marketing for Nortel's Multimedia Networks Group, he gave a
unique and valuable perspective on ATM.

Mr. Cobban, a long time veteran of both the AIW and SNA, talked
about The History of Internetworking. Giving the audience the
benefit of his years of experience in this arena, he both lauded
the progress enabled by the AIW and cautioned us to be wary of
falling prey to living in "the Age of Mediocrity".

--  Consultant Perspective  --

Peter Williams of Williams Network Analysis, Ltd, UK, followed up
his tutorial with "Comparing APPN Implementations Through
Simulation".  During second hour of his presentation Peter
provided a live demonstration of a beta-version of a personal
computer simulation-based modeling tool.

--  AIW Business  --

Chuck Brotman, the AIW Chair, went through the presentation he
gave at the opening plenary session of the February, 1996 ATM
Forum Technical Committee meeting.  At the ATM Forum plenary, in
front of an estimated audience of 800 people, Chuck represented
the AIW in asking for, and explaining the possible benefits of, a
formal liaison between the ATM Forum and the AIW, in order to
address SNA over ATM.

After discussing the ATM Forum plenary, Chuck described to the
AIW other related events which occurred at the ATM Forum meeting,
including the MPOA working group, and an SNA over ATM BOF, led by
Chuck and Gary Dudley.  The net result appears to be a
willingness on the part of the ATM Forum for a forum-to-workshop
liaison, embodied in the person of Gary Dudley, for the purpose
of cross pollinating the two groups.  Most likely, the ATM forum
will peer review the AP- or CP-level AIW HPR over ATM document,
and will hopefully provide pointers to it as well as a letter of
recommendation.  This is similar to the successful arrangement
between the ATM and Frame Relay Forums.

Next, Chuck showed the remaining 1996 AIW schedule (AIW-11 July
15-18, and AIW-12 Nov 4-7, both in Raleigh) and discussed
possibilities for 1997.  There was a consensus that 3 times per
year was still the right frequency for the AIW to meet, and that
Hawaii would be an excellent choice for a "West Coast" venue in
1997.  Chuck promised to look further into the feasibility of
having AIW-14 in Hawaii.

***  AIW 10 MVP ***

I would like to take a moment to recognize someone for making
substantive technical contributions to APPN and the AIW.  Jim
Cobban, in an effort to simultaneously look out for the best
interests of the Nortel company and its customers, and to pursue
greater generality in the architecture and use of APPN/HPR
products over Frame Relay and ATM subnetworks, made two technical
submissions at this AIW.  Both submissions were well received,
and in some cases enhanced by the other attendees.  We should
laud Jim's efforts and results as a fine example of technical
"coopetition".  To that end, I hereby award Jim with the title of
MVP (Most Valuable Participant) of AIW 10. Congratulations, Jim,
I believe that you have done a service to all of us.

I hope that I will have the opportunity to confer a similar award
to others of you, at future AIWs.

*** More Thanks ***

On behalf of the AIW, and myself, thanks to the many people who
helped make this AIW successful.  Thanks to Barb Sampair, our
conference administrator; Andy Barclay, the technical and agenda
coordinator; members of the AIW production team;  speakers Tony
Rybczynski, Jim Cobban, and Peter Williams; all of the SIG, RIG,
and BOF Chairs (and substitutes), editors, note takers, and
participants; and to the hotel staff.  Thanks to all of you for
yet another successful AIW.

See you next time.

Best regards,
Chuck Brotman
AIW Chair