Group Test Period for iSCSI interoperability - call for interest

["Barry Reinhold - Lamprey POP3" <bbr@lampreyNetworks.com>]

To anyone who has an interest:

	A number of people have expressed some interest in getting together in a
technical debugging environment to try and see what types of issues come up
with early iSCSI prototypes. This is usually a great way to see how
different people have read and understood a draft, and is also a big help in
identifying interoperability issues before they get ingrained into
implementatons.

So, as a "toe in the water" step, I would like to propose a group test
period, as outlined below, and get some feedback as to who would like to
participate in such an event.

Group Test Period Overview:

A three day test period that would run Tuesday - Thursday. Monday and Friday
would be open for people to make adhoc arrangements if they so desired.

Very informal "pair up with someone else and try" process for the first two
days followed by an attempt at putting together groups of devices on the
third day.

There would be no real expectation that anything has to "work right" and
people could drop out, fix things, and rejoin on the first two days. This
type of early testing is most effective when development engineers attend
and bring the toys they need to fix bugs.

The goal would be to work based on the current draft but implementations
that were at previous draft levels could test against other implentations
that were at that level.

ISCSI would be the focus but if there are groups of people who want to get
together and do other storage over IP protocols, and there is someone
willing to coordinate part of the effort, it should be easy to accomodate.

Time wise -- mid April (17-19)? This would be turned to accomodate the
interested parties.

A fee would be charged to cover whatever costs we incurred for food and
facilities.

That being said, if your organization has an interest, send me an email or
post to the reflector. If there are six + implementations ready to try we'll
give it a go as an "event". If there is a larger group (15 + players) the
date may have to be pushed back due to organizational issues.

The following information would be helpful:

1. Date desired
2. Protocol(s) you want to do
3. Roles your stuff can play (iSCSI initiator, target, bridge, gateway)
4. Draft level you want to test at
5. Contact email and phone.


Barry Reinhold
603-868-5144