On Wed, 25 Sep 2013, Jeroen van der Ham wrote:
Hmm… that seems to be an unneeded artificial restriction. I should be able to build up my unidirectional topologies into other network constructs based on my needs. Saying you can only have unidirectional topology is like saying you can paint as much art as you want but only using black.
Agreed 100%. While most things are unidirectional at the bottom (there are exceptions like true ethers), some equipment can only be controlled from a bidirectional point of view (say, most switches). They are by all accounts bidirectional as that is what can be controlled.
As soon as we would add this construct everyone would just use NML to construct bidirectional topologies, and leaving out the unidirectional part. Then if the need ever arises to do asymmetrical, unidirectional, or disjoint return paths, then you can't because everyone is using bidirectional constructs.
If everyone could just buy ready-made cars, no-one would assemble their own cars or build weird 7-cylinder combustion engines, and very few people would even know how a car worked. Best regards, Henrik Henrik Thostrup Jensen <htj at nordu.net> Software Developer, NORDUnet