Design Considerations for Low Power Internet Protocols
draft-ayers-low-power-interop-01

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Independent Submission                                          H. Ayers
Internet-Draft                                                  P. Levis
Intended status: Informational                       Stanford University
Expires: January 14, 2021                                  July 13, 2020

         Design Considerations for Low Power Internet Protocols
                    draft-ayers-low-power-interop-01

Abstract

   Low-power wireless networks provide IPv6 connectivity through
   6LoWPAN, a set of standards to aggressively compress IPv6 packets
   over small maximum transfer unit (MTU) links such as 802.15.4.

   The entire purpose of IP was to interconnect different networks, but
   we find that different 6LoWPAN implementations fail to reliably
   communicate with one another.  These failures are due to stacks
   implementing different subsets of the standard out of concern for
   code size.  We argue that this failure stems from 6LoWPAN's design,
   not implementation, and is due to applying traditional Internet
   protocol design principles to low-power networks.

   We propose three design principles for Internet protocols on low-
   power networks, designed to prevent similar failures in the future.
   These principles are based around the importance of providing
   flexible tradeoffs between code size and energy efficiency.  We apply
   these principles to 6LoWPAN and show that the modified protocol
   provides a wide range of implementation strategies while allowing
   implementations with different strategies to reliably communicate.

Status of This Memo

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

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   material or to cite them other than as "work in progress."

   This Internet-Draft will expire on January 14, 2021.

Ayers & Levis           Expires January 14, 2021                [Page 1]
Internet-Draft                 Design-Low                      July 2020

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Table of Contents

   1.  Introduction  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   2
   2.  Background  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
   3.  6LoWPAN Today . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   6
   4.  Traditional Principles: Not Low-Power . . . . . . . . . . . .  10
   5.  Three Principles  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  10
     5.1.  Principle 1: Capability Spectrum  . . . . . . . . . . . .  10
     5.2.  Principle 2: Capability Discovery . . . . . . . . . . . .  11
     5.3.  Principle 3: Explicit and Finite Bounds . . . . . . . . .  12
   6.  A Principled 6LoWPAN  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  12
     6.1.  Principle 1: Capability Spectrum  . . . . . . . . . . . .  13
     6.2.  Principle 2: Capability Discovery . . . . . . . . . . . .  16
     6.3.  Principle 3: Provide Reasonable Bounds  . . . . . . . . .  16
   7.  Evaluation  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  17
     7.1.  Implementations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  17
     7.2.  Compile-Time Costs  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  18
     7.3.  Run-time Performance  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  20
   8.  Discussion and Conclusions  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  21
   9.  Definitions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  22
     9.1.  Terminology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  22
   10. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  22
   11. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  22
   12. References  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  22
     12.1.  Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  22
     12.2.  Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  23
   Authors' Addresses  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  25

1.  Introduction