Open Stack

Howdy folks!

Based on this morning's IRC meeting, it seems to me there's some contention
and confusion over the need for "single call" functionality for load
balanced services in the new API being discussed. This is what I understand:

* Those advocating "single call" are arguing that this simplifies the API
for users, and that it more closely reflects the users' experience with
other load balancing products. They don't want to see this functionality
necessarily delegated to an orchestration layer (Heat), because
coordinating how this works across two OpenStack projects is unlikely to
see success (ie. it's hard enough making progress with just one project). I
get the impression that people advocating for this feel that their current
users would not likely make the leap to Neutron LBaaS unless some kind of
functionality or workflow is preserved that is no more complicated than
what they currently have to do.

* Those (mostly) against the idea are interested in seeing the API provide
primitives and delegating "higher level" single-call stuff to Heat or some
other orchestration layer. There was also the implication that if
"single-call" is supported, it ought to support both simple and advanced
set-ups in that single call. Further, I sense concern that if there are
multiple ways to accomplish the same thing supported in the API, this
redundancy breeds complication as more features are added, and in
developing test coverage. And existing Neutron APIs tend to expose only
primitives. I get the impression that people against the idea could be
convinced if more compelling reasons were illustrated for supporting
single-call, perhaps other than "we don't want to change the way it's done
in our environment right now."

I've mostly stayed out of this debate because our solution as used by our
customers presently isn't "single-call" and I don't really understand the
requirements around this.

So! I would love it if some of you could fill me in on this, especially
since I'm working on a revision of the proposed API. Specifically, what I'm
looking for is answers to the following questions:

1. Could you please explain what you understand single-call API
functionality to be?

2. Could you describe the simplest use case that uses single-call API in
your environment right now? Please be very specific--  ideally, a couple
examples of specific CLI commands a user might run, or API (along with
specific configuration data) would be great.

3. Could you describe the most complicated use case that your single-call
API supports? Again, please be very specific here.

4. What percentage of your customer base are used to using single-call
functionality, and what percentage are used to manipulating primitives?

Thanks!
Stephen


-- 
Stephen Balukoff
Blue Box Group, LLC
(800)613-4305 x807
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