The primary technical topics covered by the Internet Area include: the IP layer (both IPv4 and IPv6), implications of IPv6 adoption, co-existence between the IP versions, DNS, DHCP, IP mobility, multihoming, multicast, host and router configuration, time protocols, and Internet of Things, along with various link-layer technologies.
The Internet Area is responsible for specifying how IP will run over new link-layer protocols as they are defined. New link-layer protocols still being defined now are in emerging technologies like IoT or constrained networking.
Between them, the Internet ADs are expected to have a solid understanding of these technologies, including issues related to IP addressing, name resolution, forwarding, tunneling, fragmentation, and wireless link-layers.
Since the Internet Area includes a broad range of technical topics, the Internet Area ADs typically divide the WGs that they manage based on workload and expertise. To assist the ADs, there is an Internet Area directorate and an IoT Directorate. However, with the large number of WGs, the Internet Area has historically required considerable time commitment and breadth of expertise from its ADs. As the role of the AD requires significant interaction with the Internet Area directorates, the Internet area workgroups, and other Areas, the ADs are expected to have awareness of contemporary management techniques in dealing with change and challenging technical and personnel situations.
The Internet Area traditionally intersects most frequently with all of the other Areas. Interaction with the Transport Area is related to work on address translation, fragmentation, ICMP, and multihoming mechanisms. Interaction with the Routing Area concentrates mainly on the relationship between the operation of the IP layer and routing functionality, as well some specific touchpoints related to routing for constrained devices. Interaction with the Operations and Management Area is focused on operations required for IPv6 adoption, new sub-IP technologies, YANG development, and AAA interactions. Interaction with the Security Area is focused on topics such as DNS security and privacy, IPsec usage, and network access control. The touchpoints with the ART area are related to DNS and to the IoT space where there are tight interactions between application-layer protocols such as CoAP and IPv6-over-constrained-link-layer adaptations in order to provide better efficiency. Cross-area expertise in any of these Areas is particularly useful.
The Internet Area is also often involved in the adaptation of a variety of technologies to IP, some of which may require interactions with many other organizations such as 3GPP, IEEE, BBF, ETSI, and Cablelabs. There are also ad-hoc interactions with several standardization organizations in the IoT space. Expertise with liaison processes and an understanding of how Internet Area protocols are used in various networks (such as Broadband, wireless & cellular networks, low-power networks, large datacenters, and the "Internet of Things"), is highly desirable. Given all of the above an ideal candidate, in this cycle, should have a deep understanding of IPv6, DNS, low-power wireless technologies, IoT, mobile and constrained devices and networks.
The content of this page was last updated on 2022-07-07. It was migrated from the old Trac wiki on 2023-02-17.