(just jumping in over my head :)
>  | 	I still believe RFC2462 assumes the following:
>  | 	- the box to be autoconfigured is a host, not a router
>
>Yes (though just to confuse things, most routers are hosts before
>routing is enabled... eg: routers sometimes boot over the net, or
>load configuration over the net - when they're doing that, they're
>hosts).

that's begging the point.  when a router netboots, the configuration
that it loads (usually in the form of a config file for *that
router*), is much more intricate and complicated than any autoconfig
capabilities of anything i'm aware of.  in the case of a cisco, for
example, my config file is going to contain (in addition to interface
addresses, a hostname, a domain name, and a few name servers) several
routes, a bunch of filters, and possibly some bgp configuration
information.  there are also passwords, secrets, and other features
(no ip source-route, ip subnet zero, no tcp-small-servers, etc).

imho, when rfc2462 says that "the (auto)configuration of routers is
beyond the scope of this document", it's really the authors saying
that it's a really big can of worms and no one has yet expended the
mental effort to figure out all the possible needs or features or
pitfalls of something like that.  true, they're not saying you can't,
but in my (admittedly) conservative opinion, you shouldn't.

-- 
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