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Date:      Mon, 29 Aug 2005 11:47:12 -0700
From:      Brooks Davis <brooks@one-eyed-alien.net>
To:        Max Laier <max@love2party.net>
Cc:        freebsd-net@freebsd.org, Bart Van Kerckhove <bart@it-ss.be>, thompsa@freebsd.org, freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org
Subject:   Re: Feature requests / inquiries.
Message-ID:  <20050829184712.GF18276@odin.ac.hmc.edu>
In-Reply-To: <200508292010.02732.max@love2party.net>
References:  <001301c5acb2$36d8c820$020b000a@bartwrkstxp> <20050829175029.GC18276@odin.ac.hmc.edu> <200508292010.02732.max@love2party.net>

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On Mon, Aug 29, 2005 at 08:09:43PM +0200, Max Laier wrote:
> On Monday 29 August 2005 19:50, Brooks Davis wrote:
> > On Mon, Aug 29, 2005 at 05:56:25PM +0200, Bart Van Kerckhove wrote:
> > > Dear Sirs / Fellow Freebsd Freaks,
> > >
> > > I've been using FreeBSD for a while now as a routing/firewalling
> > > platform, but recent developments in our network infrastructure confr=
ont
> > > me with some lack of features in the IPstack.
> > > In a nutshell, i'm looking for support for (in order of importance to=
 me)
> > > : (r)STP, ECMP, and LACP.
> > >
> > > For STP, i have found a patch that contained a port from netbsd code =
of
> > > if_bridge ; but i'm way too insecure about running this on a producti=
on
> > > system.
> > > For ECMP, the only thing i found out was that there used to be a patc=
hset
> > > that did something like it, but went defunct after 4.8.
> > > LACP: no idea at all, sorry :)
> > >
> > > As these are features we'll be using some time soon now, i can say we
> > > _need_ them. I have even seriously considered moving to NetBSD; the l=
ack
> > > of NIC polling support for the intel chipsets i'm using is holding me
> > > back at the moment.
> > > I do not want to move over to linux, for various reasons.
> > > So I figured perhaps some of the freebsd community is also interested=
 in
> > > these features, and I might as well sponsor (part of?) its developmen=
t.
> > > Are there any persons interested in developing these features, or do =
they
> > > already exist and am I just plain ignorant (forgive me if that is the
> > > case). Please note that i'm not interested in the netgraph approach, =
as
> > > that's (imho) just a hack around it, and it's not functioning with for
> > > example gnu/zebra et all.
> > >
> > > I am looking for short- and long-term solutions, anything that's
> > > developed trough sponsoring i'd be happy to contribute to the main tr=
ee.
> > > As this would be the first time we actually ask for a specific featur=
e in
> > > any OSS software, I could be way off the scale with the figures i had=
 in
> > > mind. This would be about 200 to 400 euro per feature, the more impor=
tant
> > > ones like STP and ECMP are totally open to discussion.
> > >
> > > Any takers? Any enlightenment? Thanks for helping out in advance ;)
> >
> > if_bridge has been imported into FreeBSD 6.0 and I believe will be
> > merged to 5.x before 5.5.
>=20
> A candidate MFC patchset is at:=20
> http://people.freebsd.org/~thompsa/if_bridge-5stable.diff and is believed=
 to=20
> be production quality (judging from the reports for RELENG_6 so far).  Th=
ere=20
> might be minor problems and/or yet undiscovered problems, but only testin=
g=20
> gets it there.  Andrew is certainly thankful for any feedback!
>=20
> > I can't speak for ECMP.
> >
> > LACP is supported by ng_fec.  The fact that you don't like it is a
> > seperate issue.  FWIW, ng_fec only uses netgraph for configuration.
> > It's not really a netgraph node.  I'd personally like to see OpenBSD's
> > if_trunk imported and LACP added, but I certainly don't have time.
>=20
> It's certainly a good idea to look at if_trunk.  I don't have hardware to=
=20
> build a testbed, but I belive there are people out there who do and also =
have=20
> the skills to make it happen.  The main problem is: Whoever does this mus=
t=20
> have (physical) access to a reasonable testbed and free time while there=
=20
> (i.e. agreement with employer etc)

I've got the equipment access, but lack the time.  Untangling the mess
in the VLAN and EtherChannel support has been on my like for a couple
years now, but I have know idea when or if I'll get to it.  FWIW, a
Catalyst 2950 series switch will do EtherChannel and they appear to be
available on e-bay for under $500 if someone wants to work on this.

-- Brooks

--=20
Any statement of the form "X is the one, true Y" is FALSE.
PGP fingerprint 655D 519C 26A7 82E7 2529  9BF0 5D8E 8BE9 F238 1AD4

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