Certification Test Updates

[kcochran]

As an FYI, there will be updates to the core tests in the next few weeks.  Mainly they're just cleanups on process, removing elements that didn't really need user intervention (user code generation for example), various bug fixes, better reporting when something fails and the like.  The one that most people are likely to not trip over is a complete revamp of the Sage step.  The previous implementation had a number of edge cases which didn't always catch valid v6-only resolution.  The new one will, and should no longer require the manual requests for those edge cases.

Since the question has come up in the past in regards to the intent (and what the new implementation will require) of the Sage level, I'll clarify that here.

The Sage objective requires the ability to complete an entirely IPv6-only resolution of the hostname used originally in the Enthusiast objective, where we fetched a web page from you.  This means a v6 query to the root nameservers, following delegation down until we get an error or an authoritative reply for the AAAA for that hostname.  Queries to delegated nameservers also work in the same fashion.  If their AAAAs come along in the Additional section, great, glue is important and makes queries more efficient where it can be used.  If not, we go back to the roots, and work up from there.  Any step we reach a dead-end and exhaust all candidate nameservers when working to the original hostname, the test will report a fail.

There's still some knocking off rough edges to do until these changes go live, so it may be a few weeks until they're in-place.

If there's anything you'd like to see feature-wise on the existing tests, now is the best time to ask for it.  For example, Enthusiast is planned to gain the ability to check https URLs.

[kcochran]

Tests have been updated.

• Enthusiast now has a "Use TLS" option to check https URLs.  This does not also check certificate validity, as that's outside of the scope of the test objective.
  
• All tests have more useful status and error messages where applicable.
• Unneeded actions have been removed from applicable tests (requesting user codes, etc.)
• Sage no longer will request contact with support for certain out-of-bailiwick delegations.  It's now a more robust implementation, which should handle all edge cases.  As such, there's also no need to edit the hostname down to permit resolution, as had been the case.

If anyone finds anything that isn't working as expected, please let us know at ipv6@he.net.