NETCONF Data Modeling Language (netmod)

Last Modified: 2008-08-21

Additional information is available at tools.ietf.org/wg/netmod

Chair(s):

  • David Partain <david.partain@ericsson.com>

  • David Harrington <ietfdbh@comcast.net>

    Operations and Management Area Director(s):

  • Dan Romascanu <dromasca@avaya.com>
  • Ronald Bonica <rbonica@juniper.net>

    Operations and Management Area Advisor:

  • Dan Romascanu <dromasca@avaya.com>

    Mailing Lists:

    General Discussion: netmod@ietf.org
    To Subscribe: netmod-request@ietf.org
    In Body: In msg body: subscribe
    Archive: http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/netmod/

    Description of Working Group:

    The NETCONF Working Group has completed a base protocol to be
    used for configuration management.  However, the NETCONF protocol
    does not include a standard content layer.  The specifications do
    not include a modeling language or accompanying rules that can be
    used to model the management information that is to be configured
    using NETCONF. This has resulted in inconsistent syntax and
    interoperability problems. The purpose of NETMOD is to support
    the ongoing development of IETF and vendor-defined data models
    for NETCONF.

    NETMOD's requirements are drawn from the RCDML requirements draft
    (draft-presuhn-rcdml) and documents referenced therein.

    The WG will define a "human-friendly" modeling language defining
    the semantics of operational data, configuration data,
    notifications, and operations.  This language will focus on
    readability and ease of use.  This language must be able to serve
    as the normative description of NETCONF data models.  The WG will
    use YANG (draft-bjorklund-yang) as its starting point for this
    language.

    Language abstractions that facilitate model extensibility and
    reuse have been identified as a work area and will be considered
    as a work item or may be integrated into the YANG document based
    on WG consensus.

    The WG will define a canonical mapping of this language to
    NETCONF XML instance documents, the on-the-wire format of
    YANG-defined XML content.  Only data models defined in YANG will
    have to adhere to this on-the-wire format.

    In order to leverage existing XML tools for validating NETCONF
    data in various contexts and also facilitate exchange of data
    models and schemas with other IETF working groups, the WG will
    define standard mapping rules from YANG to the DSDL data modeling
    framework (ISO/IEC 19757) with additional annotations to preserve
    semantics.

    The initial YANG mapping rules specifications are expressly defined for
    NETCONF modeling.  However, there may be future areas of
    applicability beyond NETCONF, and the WG must provide suitable
    language extensibility mechanisms to allow for such future work.
    The NETMOD WG will only address modeling NETCONF devices and the
    language extensibility mechanisms.  Any application of YANG to
    other protocols is future work.

    The WG will consult with the NETCONF WG to ensure that NETMOD's
    decision do not conflict with planned work in NETCONF (e.g.,
    locking, notifications).

    While it is desirable to provide a migration path from existing
    MIB modules to YANG data models (modules), it is not a
    requirement to provide full compatibility between SMIv2 and YANG.
    The Working Group will determine which constructs (e.g., conformance
    statements) are not relevant for translation from SMIv2 to YANG. YANG
    is
    also permitted to introduce constructs that cannot be expressed in
    SMIv2.  However, all basic types that can be represented in SMIv2 must
    be expressible in YANG.

    Initial deliverables are below.  The working group may choose to
    combine multiple deliverables into a single document where deemed
    appropriate.

    1. An architecture document explaining the relationship
    between YANG and its inputs and outputs. (informational)

    2. The YANG data modeling language and semantics (proposed
    standard)

    3. Mapping rules of YANG to XML instance data in NETCONF
    (proposed standard)

    4. YIN, a semantically equivalent fully reversible mapping to an
    XML-based syntax for YANG.  YIN is simply the data model in an XML
    syntax that can be manipulated using existing XML tools (e.g., XSLT)
    (proposed standard)

    5. Mapping rules of YANG to DSDL data modeling framework (ISO/IEC
    19757), including annotations for DSDL to preserve top-level
    semantics during translation (proposed standard).

    6. A standard type library for use by YANG (proposed standard)

    Goals and Milestones:

    Jun 2008  All _individual_ drafts available that will be used as input into the WG documents (draft-bjorklund-yang, architecture draft, YIN draft, YANG standard library draft, DSDL mapping rules draft)
    Aug 2008  Initial set of WG drafts: architecture, YANG, YIN, YANG standard library, DSDL mapping rules (if there is one/more individual draft), based on WG decisions in Dublin
    Sep 2008  Initial DSDL mapping rules document
    Oct 2008  01 of YANG, DSDL, architecture, YIN, and standard library draft. If split out, -00 of on-the-wire XML draft.
    Feb 2009  WGLC for architecture doc
    Mar 2009  Submit the architecture doc to the IESG for publication as an Informational RFC
    Aug 2009  WGLC for YANG, YIN, XML on-the-wire (if split out), YANG standard library, DSDL mapping rules
    Sep 2009  Submit YANG, YIN, XML on-the-wire (if split out), YANG standard library, DSDL mapping rules to the IESG for publication as a Proposed Standard

    Internet-Drafts:

    YANG - A data modeling language for NETCONF (245543 bytes)

    No Request For Comments

    IETF Secretariat - Please send questions, comments, and/or suggestions to ietf-web@ietf.org.

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