RE: LCUP issue: What is "a while"?

At 06:26 AM 2002-09-04, Liben, Michael (GTS) wrote:
>The "MUST wait for a while" would be consistent with most other network algorithms. If it doesn't wait, it may cause unintentional denial of service attacks by swamping the server with connection requests. 

Jim's comment was that the phrase "MUST wait a while" is a
meaningless mandatory requirement.  A nanosecond can be viewed
as a long while in some contexts, a century can be viewed
as a short while in some contexts.  While the document
could attempt to define what an appropriate while is in
this context, the document likely would be better off not
stating this as mandatory requirement.

Kurt

>-----Original Message-----
>From: Jim Sermersheim [mailto:[email protected]] 
>Sent: Wednesday, September 04, 2002 12:53 AM
>To: [email protected]; Jim Sermersheim
>Subject: LCUP issue: What is "a while"?
>
>
>Section 4.8 states "it MUST wait for a while before attempting another
>synchronization session with the server. "
>
>If we're going to use an imperative like MUST, we ought to not use
>vague language like "a while". I suggest we drop the MUST anyway--is
>there an interoperability issue here?
>
>Jim