Subject: why is zeroconf restricted to a link/ lan segment ?

From: Chandrasekhar Varada <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 26 Jan 2002 00:01:35 -0800 (PST)

Greetings!

I have a basic doubt. 
Zeroconf link local address draft has a restriction on
the packet forwarding, i.e Router should not forward
the packets if its  source or destination address is a
link local address. This restricts the  scope of
zeroconf to a link and so it cannot be extended to
multiple networks or to a corporate network. 

Is this because, we have DHCP for that? or 
is there any other specific reason?

Thanks for you time,
Chandu.

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From: Stuart Cheshire <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 26 Jan 2002 02:09:19 -0800

>is there any other specific reason?

You have kind-of answered the question yourself.

The point of Zeroconf is to enable IP networking in the absence of 
traditional supporting infrastructure. We want IP networking to work with 
just a couple of IP hosts on their own -- no DHCP server, no DNS server, 
nothing else.

If you have more than one link, you need to have some kind of box to 
connect the two links together. That box is supporting infrastructure. 
Once you have that box there, it is a small step to also put a DHCP 
server in it, and other supporting services.

The purpose of Zeroconf is not to compete with DHCP and other established 
techniques that already work well. The purpose of Zeroconf is to to 
provide a safety net so that product developers can produce software (and 
hardware) products that can safely that assume IP communication is always 
available, even in environments where traditional supporting network 
infrastructure is not.

Stuart Cheshire <[email-masked]>
 * Wizard Without Portfolio, Apple Computer
 * Chairman, IETF ZEROCONF
 * www.stuartcheshire.org