Hi @ZackDS thanks for the questions, I guess replacing a node for maintenance is a “new case” that we have not discussed yet in terms of process, so good that you bring this up.
To give some background, all node machines currently support IPv6. All Gen1 NPs are requested to have at least 2 nodes deployed with IPv4, the reason being that is supports some features like http outcalls and bitcoin. But a node provider can only reinstall a node when it is no active in a subnet. If a node is active in a subnet, the node first has to be removed from that subnet and replaced by another node machine. So far, the DRE team is submitting these proposals (although in the future we want to instruct NPs to do this themselves).
Yes, the Ops team from Dfinity requested the NP to redeploy IPv4 on these two nodes, and the NP subsequently asked the DRE team to remove one of the nodes that was in a subnet to be removed.
So far, the requests are done directly to the Dfinity OPS team (e.g. through the Element channel we have for NPs). What we can do for example is ask each NP to add a short forum post in the subnet management thread each time they request to replace the node. Let me know if you think this would work.
All Gen1 nodes are deployed with HSM key, the feature to deploy a node without HSM using dfx was only added recently. So this basically means there is no other way than first to remove the node from a subnet.
@ZackDS @timk11 let me know what you think would be the best process for validating these redeployment requests. I am open to either reject this proposal and to resubmit it with e.g. a forum post by the NP, or we adopt this proposal and follow the new process the next time a replacement requests comes along.