The IEEE 802.1™ Working Group This Working Group develops standards and recommended practices for the overall IEEE 802 LAN/MAN architecture; enables internetworking among IEEE 802 LANs and MANs, predominantly in the form of Bridging and VLAN standards; and creates advanced protocol layers.<http://www.ieee802.org/1/>

 

Revision of IEEE Std 802.1X
IEEE P802.1X-REV, the revision draft for IEEE 802.1X, has undergone its first Sponsor Ballot and first recirculation; a small number of residual comments were addressed during the July meeting of 802.1. Following a second recirculation ballot during the July/August timeframe, the project should be submitted for final approval in September 2004.

Extension to IEEE 803 VLAN Bridging Technology to Support Service Provision
 Work under the PAR, IEEE P802.1ad, "Provider Bridges," seeks to define the technology needed to support IEEE 802 VLAN technology in service provision environments. Draft 3 of this project will be circulated during the September/October timeframe for a further Task Group ballot.

Discovery Protocol
 P802.1AB was issued for a first Sponsor Ballot in June; following resolution of ballot comments during our July meeting, the next draft will be issued for a recirculation ballot in the next few weeks. It is anticipated that this project will be submitted for final approval in September 2004.

MAC Security
This project, P802.1AE, covers the work necessary to define a secure frame format for LAN technologies. Work is continuing with resolution of comments on the last Task Group ballot.

”Key Agreement”
This project, P802.1AF,
extends IEEE Std 802.1X (Port-based Network Access Control) to establish security associations for 802.1AE MAC Security, and provide media access method independent association discovery. The July meeting of 802.1 saw further progress in developing the technical basis of the architecture and protocols that will be defined in this project.

 Connectivity Fault Management
The PAR for Connectivity Fault Management has now been approved by the Standards Board as a new project. Work is now under way to develop the Editor’s draft to the point where a Task Group ballot can be issued.

 Anticipated new work
At our October interim meeting, it is anticipated that 802.1 will discuss three potential new areas of work and will develop text for PARs for future projects in these areas:

·         “Backbone” Provider Bridges – aimed at improving the scaling properties of provider bridged networks;

·         A revised, “Vectorized” version of the GARP protocol and the two applications, GVRP and GMRP, that make use of it. This revision is aimed at improved GARP support for Provider Bridges;

·         A new standard for “media conversion” devices – these devices would allow “Ethernet-like” services provided over other bearer technologies to be conveniently integrated into provider bridged networks.

Upcoming IEEE 802.1 Meetings:
* 4-7 October 2004, Interim Meeting in Ottawa, Canada.
* 15-19 November 2004 -- IEEE Plenary Meeting in San Antonio, USA

Back to top of Bulletin