Recommendations for Transport Port Uses
draft-ietf-tsvwg-port-use-01

TSVWG                                                          J. Touch
Internet Draft                                                 USC/ISI
Intended status: Best Current Practice                February 25, 2013
Expires: August 2013

                  Recommendations for Transport Port Uses
                     draft-ietf-tsvwg-port-use-01.txt

Status of this Memo

   This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the
   provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.

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

   Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six
   months and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents
   at any time.  It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as
   reference material or to cite them other than as "work in progress."

   The list of current Internet-Drafts can be accessed at
   http://www.ietf.org/ietf/1id-abstracts.txt

   The list of Internet-Draft Shadow Directories can be accessed at
   http://www.ietf.org/shadow.html

   This Internet-Draft will expire on August 25, 2013.

Copyright Notice

   Copyright (c) 2013 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
   document authors. All rights reserved.

   This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
   Provisions Relating to IETF Documents
   (http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of
   publication of this document. Please review these documents
   carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with
   respect to this document. Code Components extracted from this
   document must include Simplified BSD License text as described in
   Section 4.e of the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without

Touch                  Expires August 25, 2013                 [Page 1]
Internet-Draft  Recommendations for Transport Port Use    February 2013

   warranty as described in the Simplified BSD License.

Abstract

   This document provides recommendations to application and service
   designers on how to use the transport protocol port number space to
   help in its preservation.

Table of Contents

   1. Introduction...................................................2
   2. Conventions used in this document..............................2
   3. History........................................................3
   4. Current Port Use...............................................4
   5. What is a Port?................................................5
   6. Conservation...................................................6
   7. How to Use Assigned Ports......................................7
      7.1. Do You Need a Port?.......................................7
      7.2. How Many Ports?...........................................8
      7.3. Picking a Port Number.....................................9
      7.4. Support for Security.....................................10
      7.5. Support for Future Versions..............................10
      7.6. Transport Protocols......................................11
      7.7. When to Request an Assignment............................12
      7.8. Other Considerations.....................................13
   8. Security Considerations.......................................13
   9. IANA Considerations...........................................14
   10. References...................................................14
      10.1. Normative References....................................14
      10.2. Informative References..................................14
   11. Acknowledgments..............................................16

1. Introduction

   This document provides information and advice to system designers on
   the use of transport port numbers and services. It provides a
   detailed historical background of the evolution of transport port
   numbers and their multiple meanings. It also provides specific
   recommendations on how to use assigned ports.

2. Conventions used in this document

   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 [RFC2119].

Touch                  Expires August 25, 2013                 [Page 2]
Internet-Draft  Recommendations for Transport Port Use    February 2013

   In this document, these words will appear with that interpretation
   only when in ALL CAPS. Lower case uses of these words are not to be