The IESG has received a request from the Pseudowire And LDP-enabled Services WG (pals) to consider the following document: - 'Use of Ethernet Control Word RECOMMENDED' <draft-ietf-pals-ethernet-cw-06.txt> as Proposed Standard The IESG plans to make a decision in the next few weeks, and solicits final comments on this action. Please send substantive comments to the ietf@ietf.org mailing lists by 2018-06-15. Exceptionally, comments may be sent to iesg@ietf.org instead. In either case, please retain the beginning of the Subject line to allow automated sorting. Abstract The pseudowire (PW) encapsulation of Ethernet, as defined in RFC 4448, specifies that the use of the control word (CW) is optional. In the absence of the CW an Ethernet pseudowire packet can be misidentified as an IP packet by a label switching router (LSR). This in turn may lead to the selection of the wrong equal-cost-multi- path (ECMP) path for the packet, leading in turn to the misordering of packets. This problem has become more serious due to the deployment of equipment with Ethernet MAC addresses that start with 0x4 or 0x6. The use of the Ethernet PW CW addresses this problem. This document recommends the use of the Ethernet pseudowire control word in all but exceptional circumstances. This document updates RFC 4448. The file can be obtained via https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-ietf-pals-ethernet-cw/ IESG discussion can be tracked via https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-ietf-pals-ethernet-cw/ballot/ No IPR declarations have been submitted directly on this I-D.
