> It often seems like all these tunnel types serve individually useful > purposes, but that we've also simply failed to reuse much if anything, > making implementation more difficult. Its seems, to me, that could > live with a few generic tunnel types, rather than a thousand > specialized ones, but the cat already seems to be out if the bag (?). we used to repeat a mantra along the lines of reliable ip transport reinvention only shows that tcp (this year's version, of course <g>) is sufficient and a good compromise among the many constraints. that philosophy never took hold in the encaps space. a tecnoloogy for every need. how much was real need and how much career/market building is left to the judgement of the observer. randy