IPv6 Working Group                                          J. Rajahalme
INTERNET-DRAFT                                                     Nokia
<draft-ietf-ipv6-flow-label-01.txt>                             A. Conta
                                                              Transwitch
                                                            B. Carpenter
                                                                     IBM
                                                              S. Deering
                                                                   Cisco
Expires: September 2002                                       March 2002


                     IPv6 Flow Label Specification
                   draft-ietf-ipv6-flow-label-01.txt


Status of this memo

   This document is an Internet-Draft and is subject to all provisions
   of Section 10 of RFC2026.

   Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering
   Task Force (IETF), its areas, and its working groups. Note that other
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Abstract

   This document specifies the usage of the IPv6 Flow Label field, the
   requirements for IPv6 source nodes labeling flows, and the
   requirements for flow state establishment methods.
















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.  Terminology and Definitions

   Classifier             An IP layer entity that selects packets based
                          on the content of packet headers according to
                          defined rules.

   Flow                   A sequence of related packets sent from a
                          source to a unicast, anycast, or multicast
                          destination. A flow could consist of all
                          packets in a specific transport connection, or
                          a media stream. However, a flow is not
                          necessarily 1:1 mapped to a transport
                          connection.

   Flow state             The information stored in an IP node driving
                          the flow classification and the flow-specific
                          treatment. The required information is
                          specified by the method defining the flow-
                          specific treatment.

   Flow state             A control mechanism used to set up the flow
   establishment method   state. A flow state establishment method can
                          be either
                          - Dynamic, under source node control (e.g.
                          RSVP),
                          - Quasi-dynamic, under network management
                          control, or
                          - Static, through manual configuration.
                          - Algorithmic (e.g. load-spreading)



   The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
   "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this
   document are to be interpreted as described in RFC 2119.


.  Introduction

   A flow is a sequence of related packets sent from a source to a
   unicast, anycast, or multicast destination. To enable specific
   processing for the flow, flow state needs to be established on the
   nodes providing the flow-specific treatment. The flow state defines
   what kind of treatment should be provided, and how to classify the
   packets to the flow.

   Traditionally, flow classifiers have been based on the 5-tuple of the
   Source and Destination Addresses, ports and the transport protocol
   type. However, these fields may be unavailable due to either
   fragmentation or encryption, or locating them past a chain of IPv6
   option headers may be inefficient. Additionally, dependence on higher


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   layer headers by the IP layer represents a layer violation, possibly
   hindering the introduction of new transport protocols.

   The 3-tuple of the Flow Label and the Source and Destination Address
   fields enables efficient IPv6 flow classification, where only IPv6
   main header fields in fixed positions are used. The specification of
   the IPv6 Flow Label field is given in section 3 below.

   The minimum level of IPv6 flow support consists of labeling the
   flows. IPv6 source nodes can label known flows (e.g. TCP connections,
   RTP streams), even if the node itself would not require any flow-
   specific treatment. Doing this enables e.g. receiver oriented
   resource reservations [RSVP]. Requirements for flow labeling are
   given in section 4.

   Specific flow state establishment methods and the related service
   models are out of scope for this specification, but the generic
   requirements enabling co-existence of different methods in IPv6 nodes
   are set forth in section 5.


.  IPv6 Flow Label Specification

   The 20-bit Flow Label field in the IPv6 header SHOULD be used by a
   source to label sequences of related packets sent to a specific
   unicast, anycast, or multicast destination. A non-zero Flow Label
   indicates that the IPv6 packet is labeled. IPv6 nodes receiving a
   labeled IPv6 packet can use the Flow Label, and Source and
   Destination Address fields to classify the packet to a certain flow.
   The packet MAY be given some flow-specific treatment based on the
   flow state established on a set of IPv6 nodes. The nature of the
   specific treatment and the methods for the flow state establishment
   are out of scope for this specification.

   The IPv6 node assigning a Flow Label value MUST keep track of all the
   Flow Label, Source Address, and Destination Address triplets in use
   to avoid creating conflicting classifiers.

   The Flow Label value set by the source MUST be delivered unchanged to
   the destination(s).

   IPv6 nodes MUST NOT assume any specific property on the Flow Label
   values assigned by source nodes. Router performance SHOULD NOT be
   dependent on the distribution of the Flow Label values. Especially,
   the Flow Label bits alone make poor material for a hash key.

   If an IPv6 node is not providing flow-specific treatment, it MUST
   ignore the field when receiving or forwarding a packet.






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.  Flow Labeling Requirements

   To support e.g. receiver oriented flow state establishment, IPv6
   source nodes SHOULD label known flows. Known flows may include e.g.
   transport connections, or media streams.

   The IPv6 source node MUST provide a facility for verifying and
   assigning new Flow Label values, and for storing the Flow Label,
   Source Address, Destination Address triplets currently in use. The
   facility MUST be used whenever a label needs to be assigned for a new
   flow. The facility MUST provide a programming interface with at least
   three functions:

   1) to assign any Flow Label value for a new flow

   2) to assign a specific Flow Label for a new flow, and

   3) to free the Flow Label value of a specific flow.

   The interface definition is beyond the scope of this document.

   Flow Label values for flows MUST be included along with the Source
   and Destination addresses as part of any flow related signaling
   dealing with the flow, e.g. transport layer connection set up, RSVP
   for resource reservation, or SDP for media session parameters.

   With [RSVP] or [SDP] either the source or the destination of the flow
   could have a preference for the Flow Label value to be used. For
   example, a multicast destination could require all the sources to use
   the same Flow Label value in order to collapse the classifier state
   to a single flow state entry, instead of having separate flow state
   for each source (ref. the Wildcard-Filter reservation style in
   [RSVP]). Therefore the source SHOULD honor the destination's request
   to mark the packets with the Flow Label value specified.


.  Flow State Establishment Requirements

   To enable flow-specific treatment, flow state needs to be established
   on all or a subset of the IPv6 nodes on the path from the source to
   the destination(s). The methods for the state establishment, as well
   as the models for flow-specific treatment are defined in separate
   specifications.

   To enable co-existence of different methods in IPv6 nodes, the
   methods MUST meet the following basic requirements:

   (1)  A packet is classified unambiguously to a flow on the basis of
        the Flow Label, and the Source and Destination Address fields.
        Depending on the method semantics, multiple such triplets MAY
        identify the same flow state (see the RSVP Wildcard-Filter
        example in section 4 above). Usage of any additional header


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        fields for flow classification is beyond the scope of this
        specification.

   (2)  The IPv6 node facility keeping track of the Flow Label, Source
        Address, Destination Address triplets MUST be utilized when
        assigning Flow Label values to new flows (see section 4 above).

   (3)  The Flow Label value 0 is reserved for non-labeled packets.

   (4)  The method MUST provide the means for flow state clean-up from
        the IPv6 nodes providing the flow-specific treatment. Both soft-
        and hard-state methods are possible.

   (5)  The method MUST provide the means for an IPv6 node to return an
        indication, if the requested flow state cannot be supported.

   (6)  Flow state establishment methods SHOULD include the Mobile IP
        Home Addresses of the source and the destination in the state
        establishment process in addition to the Care-of Addresses, if
        available. This enables avoiding state duplication on fixed
        portions of the path when either end changes its Care-of
        Address.


Security Considerations

   Anything that facilitates flow classification also increases the
   vulnerability to traffic analysis.

   The use of the Flow Label field in general enables flow
   classification also in the presence of ESP encryption of IPv6
   payloads. This allows the transport header values to remain
   confidential, which may lessen the possibilities for some forms of
   traffic analysis.


IANA Considerations

   This specification does not define any well-known values.


Acknowledgements

   The discussion on the topic in the IPv6 WG mailing list has been
   instrumental for the definition of this specification. The authors
   want to thank Steve Blake, Jim Bound, Francis Dupont, Robert Elz,
   Tony Hain, Bob Hinden, Christian Huitema, Frank Kastenholz, Charles
   Perkins, Hesham Soliman, Michael Thomas, and Margaret Wasserman for
   their contributions.





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Normative References

   [IPv6]      S. Deering, R. Hinden, "Internet Protocol Version 6
               Specification", RFC 2460, December 1998.


Informative References

   [Rajahalme] J. Rajahalme, A. Conta, "An IPv6 Flow Label Specification
               Proposal", Internet Draft <draft-rajahalme-ipv6-flow-
               label-00.txt>, November 2001, expires May 2002, Work in
               progress.

   [RFC1809]   C. Partridge, "Using the Flow Label Field in IPv6", RFC
               1809, June 1995.

   [RSVP]      R. Braden, L. Zhang, S. Berson, S. Herzog, S. Jamin,
               "Resource Reservation Protocol (RSVP) Version 1
               Functional Specification", RFC 2205, September 1997.

   [SDP]       M. Handley, V. Jacobson, "SDP: Session Description
               Protocol", RFC 2327, April 1998.


Authors' Addresses

   Jarno Rajahalme
   Nokia Research Center
   P.O. Box 407
   FIN-00045 NOKIA GROUP,
   Finland
   E-mail: jarno.rajahalme@nokia.com

   Alex Conta
   Transwitch Corporation
   3 Enterprise Drive
   Shelton, CT 06484
   USA
   Email: aconta@txc.com

   Brian E. Carpenter
   IBM Zurich Research Laboratory
   Saeumerstrasse 4 / Postfach
   8803 Rueschlikon
   Switzerland
   Email: brian@hursley.ibm.com

   Steve Deering
   Cisco Systems, Inc.
   170 West Tasman Drive
   San Jose, CA 95134-1706
   USA
   Email: deering@cisco.com

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Expiration Date

   This memo is filed as <draft-ietf-ipv6-flow-label-01.txt> and expires
   in September 2002.


















































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