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, is currently undergoing
its Sponsor Ballot; it is expected that comments received in the course of
the ballot will be reviewed at the May interim meeting of 802.1. It is likely
that, following a recirculation ballot during the May/June timeframe, the
project will be submitted for final approval around the middle of 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. Work is still under way to revise the Draft
2.0 text to address comments received. In particular, considerable progress
was made during the March meeting with regard to developing a “drop
precedence” mechanism.
Revision of IEEE 802.1D on Media Access Control (MAC)
Bridges
The revision of the 802.1D MAC Bridges
standard has now been approved by the Standards Board and publication of the
2004 revision of the standard should be expected within the next two months.
Discovery Protocol
P802.1AB was issued for a Working Group recirculation ballot in February;
the next draft will be issued for a second Working Group recirculation ballot,
with the expectation that it will then be submitted for Sponsor ballot in the
April/May timeframe.
MAC Security
This project, P802.1AE, covers the work
necessary to define a secure frame format for LAN technologies. It is
expected that the next draft of this project will be issued for a second Task
Group ballot in April/May.
”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 March meeting of 802.1 saw
considerable progress in developing the technical basis of the architecture
and protocols that will be defined in this project.
P802b has been approved
P802b, which is an extension to Standard 802, the Overview and Architecture
standard, to define registration procedures for Object Identifiers, has now
been approved by the Standards Board; publication is expected during April.
Connectivity
Fault Management PAR
The PAR for Connectivity Fault Management was approved to be forwarded for
consideration by the Standards Board as a new project. This piece of work has
been prompted by the needs of supporting the “Provider Bridging” (P802.1ad)
work; however, it is anticipated that the tools developed as part of this
project will be of utility in more conventional LAN installations as well.
Upcoming IEEE 802.1
Meetings:
* 17-20 May 2004, Interim Meeting in Barcelona, Spain.
* 12-16 July 2004 -- IEEE Plenary Meeting in Portland, OR, USA
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