On Sun, Sep 14, 2014 at 10:45 AM, Sam Stickland <sam@spacething.org> wrote:
Slightly off topic, but has there ever been a proposed protocol where hosts can register their L2/L3 binding with their connected switch (which could then propagate the binding to other switches in the Layer 2 domain)? Further discovery requests (e.g. ARP, ND) from other attached hosts could then all be directly replied, eliminating broadcast gratuitous arps. If the switches don't support the protocol they would default to flooding the discovery requests.
It seems to me that so many network are caused because of the inability to change the host mechanisms.
Sam
It looks like in 2011 Cisco proposed a technology called "OTV" that would do just that, according to this page: http://network-101.blogspot.com/2011/03/otv-vs-vpls.html Granted, it was aimed for wide-area networking, rather than control within a datacenter; but as everyone who has started doing BGP to their top of rack switches has learned, there's often good value in adopting techniques and protocols used in the wide area network within the datacenter as well. However, I haven't heard recent mention of it, so I'm guessing it failed to make a big enough splash to get any widespread adoption. Matt