6LoWPAN Working Group C. Bormann
Internet-Draft Universitaet Bremen TZI
Intended status: Standards Track March 14, 2011
Expires: September 15, 2011
6LoWPAN Generic Compression of Headers and Header-like Payloads
draft-bormann-6lowpan-ghc-02
Abstract
This short I-D provides a complete design for a simple addition to
6LoWPAN Header Compression that enables the compression of generic
headers and header-like payloads.
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Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.1. The Header Compression Coupling Problem . . . . . . . . . 3
1.2. Terminology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
2. 6LoWPAN-GHC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
2.1. Nibblecode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
3. Examples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
4. Integrating 6LoWPAN-GHC into 6LoWPAN-HC . . . . . . . . . . . 14
4.1. Compressing extension headers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
4.2. Indicating GHC capability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
5. IANA considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
6. Security considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
7. Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
8. References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
8.1. Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
8.2. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Author's Address . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
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1. Introduction
1.1. The Header Compression Coupling Problem
[I-D.ietf-6lowpan-hc] defines a scheme for header compression in
6LoWPAN [RFC4944] packets. As with most header compression schemes,
a new specification is needed for every new kind of header that needs
to be compressed. In addition, [I-D.ietf-6lowpan-hc] does not define
an extensibility scheme like the ROHC profiles defined in ROHC
[RFC3095] [RFC5795]. This leads to the difficult situation that
[I-D.ietf-6lowpan-hc] tends to be reopened and reexamined each time a
new header receives consideration (or an old header is changed and
reconsidered) in the 6lowpan/roll/core cluster of IETF working
groups. At this rate, [I-D.ietf-6lowpan-hc] will never get completed
(fortunately, by now it has passed WGLC, but the underlying problem
remains unsolved).
The purpose of the present contribution is to plug into
[I-D.ietf-6lowpan-hc] as is, using its NHC (next header compression)
concept. We add a slightly less efficient, but vastly more general
form of compression for headers of any kind and even for header-like
payloads such as those exhibited by routing protocols, DHCP, etc.
The objective is to arrive at something that can be defined on a
single page and implemented in a couple of lines of code, as opposed
to a general data compression scheme such as that defined in
[RFC1951].
1.2. Terminology
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].
The term "byte" is used in its now customary sense as a synonym for
"octet".
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2. 6LoWPAN-GHC
The format of a compressed header or payload is a simple bytecode. A
compressed header consists of a sequence of pieces, each of which
begins with a code byte, which may be followed by zero or more bytes
as its argument. Some code bytes cause bytes to be laid out in the
destination buffer, some simply modify some decompression variables.
At the start of decompressing a header or payload within a L2 packet
(= fragment), variables "sa" and "na" are initialized as zero.
The code bytes are defined as follows:
+----------+---------------------------------------------+----------+
| code | Action | Argument |
| byte | | |
+----------+---------------------------------------------+----------+
| 0kkkkkkk | Append k = 0b0kkkkkkk bytes of data in the | k bytes |
| | bytecode argument (k < 96) | of data |
| | | |
| 0110iiii | Append all bytes (possibly filling an | |
| | incomplete byte with zero bits) from | |
| | Context i | |
| | | |
| 0111iiii | Append 8 bytes from Context i; i.e., the | |
| | context value truncated/extended to 8 | |
| | bytes, and then append 0000 00FF FE00 | |
| | (i.e., 14 bytes total) | |
| | | |
| 1000nnnn | Append 0b0000nnnn+2 bytes of zeroes | |
| | | |
| 10010000 | STOP code (end of compressed data) | |
| | | |
| 1001nnnn | Enter nibblecode (Section 2.1) | |
| | | |
| 101nssss | sa += 0b0ssss000, na += 0b0000n000 | |
| | | |
| 11nnnkkk | n = na+0b00000nnn+2; s = 0b00000kkk+sa+n; | |
| | append n bytes from previously output | |
| | bytes, starting s bytes to the left of the | |
| | current output pointer; set sa = 0, na = 0 | |
+----------+---------------------------------------------+----------+
For the purposes of the backreferences, the expansion buffer is
initialized with the pseudo-header as defined in [RFC2460], at the
end of which the target buffer begins. These pseudo-header bytes are
therefore available for backreferencing, but not copied into the
final result.
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2.1. Nibblecode
(It is to be decided whether the mechanism described in this section
is worth its additional complexity. To make this decision, it would
be useful to obtain more packet captures, in particular those that do
include ASCII data - the packet-capture-based examples in Section 3
currently do not include nibblecode.)
Some headers/header-like structures, such as those used in CoAP or
DNS, may use ASCII data. There is very little redundancy by
repetition in these (DNS actually has its own compression mechanism
for repetition), so the backreferencing mechanism provided in the
bytecode is not very effective.
Efficient stateless compression for small amounts of ASCII data of
this kind is pretty much confined to Huffman (or, for even more
complexity, arithmetic) coding. The complexity can be reduced
significantly by moving to n-ary Huffman coding, i.e., optimizing not
to the bit level, but to a larger level of granularity. Informal
experiments by the author show that a 16ary Huffman coding is close
to optimal at least for a small corpus of URI data. In other words,
basing the encoding on nibbles (4-bit half-bytes) is both nearly
optimal and relatively inexpensive to implement.
The actual letter frequencies that will occur in more general 6LoWPAN
ASCII data are hard to predict. As a first indication, the author
has analyzed an HTTP-based URI corpus and found the following lower
case letters to be the ASCII characters that occur with highest
frequency: aeinorst - it is therefore most useful to compress these.
In the encoding proposed, each byte representing one of these eight
highly-compressed characters is represented by a single 4-bit nibble
from the range 0x8 to 0xF. Bytes representing printable ASCII
characters, more specifically bytes from 0x20 to 0x7F, are
represented by both of their nibbles. Bytes from 0x00 to 0x1F and
from 0x80 to 0xFF are represented by a 0x1 nibble followed by both
nibbles of the byte. An 0x0 nibble terminates the nibblecode
sequence and returns to bytecode on the next byte boundary.
The first nibble of the nibblecode is transmitted right in the "enter
nibblecode" bytecode (0x9x - note that since it is never useful to
immediately return to bytecode, the bytecode 0x90 is allocated for a
different purpose). All other nibbles of the nibblecode are
transmitted as a sequence of bytes in most-significant-nibble-first
order; any unused nibble in the last byte of a nibblecode sequence is
set to 0x0.
The encoding is summarized in Figure 1.
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0 1
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
+---+---+---+---+
| 8-F | aeinorst
+---+---+---+---+ 89ABCDEF
+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
| 2-7 | 0-F | other ASCII
+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
| 1 | 0-F | 0-F | 0xHH
+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
+---+---+---+---+
| 0 | return to bytecode
+---+---+---+---+
Figure 1: A nibble-based encoding
As an example for what level of compression can be expected, the 121
bytes of ASCII text shown in Figure 2 (taken from
[I-D.ietf-core-link-format]) are compressed into 183 nibbles of
nibblecode, which (including delimiter and padding overhead) need 93
bytes, resulting in a net compression factor of 1.30. (Note that
RFC 4944/6LoWPAN-HC supports compression only in the first of a
sequence of adaptation layer fragments; 93 bytes may not all fit into
the first fragment, so any remaining payload would be sent without
the benefit of compression.)
<http://www.example.com/sensors/temp123>;anchor="/sensors/temp"
;rel=describedby,
</t>;anchor="/sensors/temp";rel=alternate
Figure 2: Example input text (line-wrapped)
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3. Examples
This section demonstrates some relatively realistic examples derived
from actual PCAP dumps taken at previous interops. Unfortunately,
for these dumps, no context information was available, so the
relatively powerful effect of context-based compression is not shown.
(TBD: Add a couple DHCP examples.)
Figure 3 shows an RPL DODAG Information Solicitation, a quite short
RPL message that obviously cannot be improved much.
IP header:
60 00 00 00 00 08 3a ff fe 80 00 00 00 00 00 00
02 1c da ff fe 00 20 24 ff 02 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 1a
Payload:
9b 00 6b de 00 00 00 00
Pseudoheader:
fe 80 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 1c da ff fe 00 20 24
ff 02 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 1a
00 00 00 08 00 00 00 3a
copy: 04 9b 00 6b de
4 nulls: 82
Compressed:
04 9b 00 6b de 82
Was 8 bytes; compressed to 6 bytes, compression factor 1.33
Figure 3: A simple RPL example
Figure 4 shows an RPL DODAG Information Object, a longer RPL control
message that is improved a bit more (but would likely benefit
additionally from a context reference). Note that the compressed
output exposes an inefficiency in the simple-minded compressor used
to generate it; this does not devalue the example since constrained
nodes are quite likely to make use of simple-minded compressors.
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IP header:
60 00 00 00 00 5c 3a ff fe 80 00 00 00 00 00 00
02 1c da ff fe 00 30 23 ff 02 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 1a
Payload:
9b 01 7a 5f 00 f0 01 00 88 00 00 00 20 02 0d b8
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ff fe 00 fa ce 04 0e 00 14
09 ff 00 00 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 08 1e 80 20
ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff 00 00 00 00 20 02 0d b8
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ff fe 00 fa ce 03 0e 40 00
ff ff ff ff 20 02 0d b8 00 00 00 00
Pseudoheader:
fe 80 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 1c da ff fe 00 30 23
ff 02 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 1a
00 00 00 5c 00 00 00 3a
copy: 09 9b 01 7a 5f 00 f0 01 00 88
3 nulls: 81
copy: 04 20 02 0d b8
7 nulls: 85
ref(52): ff fe 00 -> ref 101nssss 0 6/11nnnkkk 1 1: a6 c9
copy: 08 fa ce 04 0e 00 14 09 ff
2 nulls: 80
copy: 01 01
7 nulls: 85
copy: 06 08 1e 80 20 ff ff
ref(2): ff ff -> ref 11nnnkkk 0 0: c0
ref(4): ff ff ff ff -> ref 11nnnkkk 2 0: d0
4 nulls: 82
ref(48): 20 02 0d b8 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ff fe 00 fa ce
-> ref 101nssss 1 4/11nnnkkk 6 0: b4 f0
copy: 03 03 0e 40
ref(9): 00 ff -> ref 11nnnkkk 0 7: c7
ref(28): ff ff ff -> ref 101nssss 0 3/11nnnkkk 1 1: a3 c9
ref(24): 20 02 0d b8 00 00 00 00
-> ref 101nssss 0 2/11nnnkkk 6 0: a2 f0
Compressed:
09 9b 01 7a 5f 00 f0 01 00 88 81 04 20 02 0d b8
85 a6 c9 08 fa ce 04 0e 00 14 09 ff 80 01 01 85
06 08 1e 80 20 ff ff c0 d0 82 b4 f0 03 03 0e 40
c7 a3 c9 a2 f0
Was 92 bytes; compressed to 53 bytes, compression factor 1.74
Figure 4: A longer RPL example
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Similarly, Figure 5 shows an RPL DAO message. One of the embedded
addresses is copied right out of the pseudoheader, the other one is
effectively converted from global to local by providing the prefix
FE80 literally, inserting a number of nulls, and copying (some of)
the IID part again out of the pseudoheader. Note that a simple
implementation would probably emit fewer nulls and copy the entire
IID; there are multiple ways to encode this 50-byte payload into 27
bytes.
IP header:
60 00 00 00 00 32 3a ff 20 02 0d b8 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 ff fe 00 33 44 20 02 0d b8 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 ff fe 00 11 22
Payload:
9b 02 58 7d 01 80 00 f1 05 12 00 80 20 02 0d b8
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ff fe 00 33 44 06 14 00 80
f1 00 fe 80 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ff fe 00
11 22
Pseudoheader:
20 02 0d b8 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ff fe 00 33 44
20 02 0d b8 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ff fe 00 11 22
00 00 00 32 00 00 00 3a
copy: 0c 9b 02 58 7d 01 80 00 f1 05 12 00 80
ref(52): 20 02 0d b8 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ff fe 00 33 44
-> ref 101nssss 1 4/11nnnkkk 6 4: b4 f4
copy: 08 06 14 00 80 f1 00 fe 80
9 nulls: 87
ref(58): ff fe 00 11 22 -> ref 101nssss 0 6/11nnnkkk 3 5: a6 dd
Compressed:
0c 9b 02 58 7d 01 80 00 f1 05 12 00 80 b4 f4 08
06 14 00 80 f1 00 fe 80 87 a6 dd
Was 50 bytes; compressed to 27 bytes, compression factor 1.85
Figure 5: An RPL DAO message
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Figure 6 shows the effect of compressing a simple ND neighbor
solicitation (again, no context-based compression).
IP header:
60 00 00 00 00 30 3a ff 20 02 0d b8 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 ff fe 00 3b d3 fe 80 00 00 00 00 00 00
02 1c da ff fe 00 30 23
Payload:
87 00 a7 68 00 00 00 00 fe 80 00 00 00 00 00 00
02 1c da ff fe 00 30 23 01 01 3b d3 00 00 00 00
1f 02 00 00 00 00 00 06 00 1c da ff fe 00 20 24
Pseudoheader:
20 02 0d b8 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ff fe 00 3b d3
fe 80 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 1c da ff fe 00 30 23
00 00 00 30 00 00 00 3a
copy: 04 87 00 a7 68
4 nulls: 82
ref(32): fe 80 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 1c da ff fe 00 30 23
-> ref 101nssss 1 2/11nnnkkk 6 0: b2 f0
copy: 04 01 01 3b d3
4 nulls: 82
copy: 02 1f 02
5 nulls: 83
copy: 02 06 00
ref(24): 1c da ff fe 00 -> ref 101nssss 0 2/11nnnkkk 3 3: a2 db
copy: 02 20 24
Compressed:
04 87 00 a7 68 82 b2 f0 04 01 01 3b d3 82 02 1f
02 83 02 06 00 a2 db 02 20 24
Was 48 bytes; compressed to 26 bytes, compression factor 1.85
Figure 6: An ND neighbor solicitation
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Figure 7 shows the compression of an ND neighbor advertisement.
IP header:
60 00 00 00 00 30 3a fe fe 80 00 00 00 00 00 00
02 1c da ff fe 00 30 23 20 02 0d b8 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 ff fe 00 3b d3
Payload:
88 00 26 6c c0 00 00 00 fe 80 00 00 00 00 00 00
02 1c da ff fe 00 30 23 02 01 fa ce 00 00 00 00
1f 02 00 00 00 00 00 06 00 1c da ff fe 00 20 24
Pseudoheader:
fe 80 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 1c da ff fe 00 30 23
20 02 0d b8 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ff fe 00 3b d3
00 00 00 30 00 00 00 3a
copy: 05 88 00 26 6c c0
3 nulls: 81
ref(48): fe 80 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 1c da ff fe 00 30 23
-> ref 101nssss 1 4/11nnnkkk 6 0: b4 f0
copy: 04 02 01 fa ce
4 nulls: 82
copy: 02 1f 02
5 nulls: 83
copy: 02 06 00
ref(24): 1c da ff fe 00 -> ref 101nssss 0 2/11nnnkkk 3 3: a2 db
copy: 02 20 24
Compressed:
05 88 00 26 6c c0 81 b4 f0 04 02 01 fa ce 82 02
1f 02 83 02 06 00 a2 db 02 20 24
Was 48 bytes; compressed to 27 bytes, compression factor 1.78
Figure 7: An ND neighbor advertisement
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Figure 8 shows the compression of an ND router solicitation. Note
that the relatively good compression is not caused by the many zero
bytes in the link-layer address of this particular capture (which are
unlikely to occur in practice): 7 of these 8 bytes are copied from
the pseudo header (the 8th byte cannot be copied as the universal/
local bit needs to be inverted).
IP header:
60 00 00 00 00 18 3a ff fe 80 00 00 00 00 00 00
ae de 48 00 00 00 00 01 ff 02 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 02
Payload:
85 00 90 65 00 00 00 00 01 02 ac de 48 00 00 00
00 01 00 00 00 00 00 00
Pseudoheader:
fe 80 00 00 00 00 00 00 ae de 48 00 00 00 00 01
ff 02 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 02
00 00 00 18 00 00 00 3a
copy: 04 85 00 90 65
ref(33): 00 00 00 00 01 -> ref 101nssss 0 3/11nnnkkk 3 4: a3 dc
copy: 02 02 ac
ref(42): de 48 00 00 00 00 01
-> ref 101nssss 0 4/11nnnkkk 5 3: a4 eb
6 nulls: 84
Compressed:
04 85 00 90 65 a3 dc 02 02 ac a4 eb 84
Was 24 bytes; compressed to 13 bytes, compression factor 1.85
Figure 8
Figure 9 shows the compression of an ND router advertisement. The
indefinite lifetime is compressed to four bytes by backreferencing;
this could be improved (at the cost of minor additional decompressor
complexity) by including some simple runlength mechanism.
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IP header:
60 00 00 00 00 60 3a ff fe 80 00 00 00 00 00 00
10 34 00 ff fe 00 11 22 fe 80 00 00 00 00 00 00
ae de 48 00 00 00 00 01
Payload:
86 00 55 c9 40 00 0f a0 1c 5a 38 17 00 00 07 d0
01 01 11 22 00 00 00 00 03 04 40 40 ff ff ff ff
ff ff ff ff 00 00 00 00 20 02 0d b8 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 20 02 40 10 00 00 03 e8
20 02 0d b8 00 00 00 00 21 03 00 01 00 00 00 00
20 02 0d b8 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ff fe 00 11 22
Pseudoheader:
fe 80 00 00 00 00 00 00 10 34 00 ff fe 00 11 22
fe 80 00 00 00 00 00 00 ae de 48 00 00 00 00 01
00 00 00 60 00 00 00 3a
copy: 0c 86 00 55 c9 40 00 0f a0 1c 5a 38 17
2 nulls: 80
copy: 06 07 d0 01 01 11 22
4 nulls: 82
copy: 06 03 04 40 40 ff ff
ref(2): ff ff -> ref 11nnnkkk 0 0: c0
ref(4): ff ff ff ff -> ref 11nnnkkk 2 0: d0
4 nulls: 82
copy: 04 20 02 0d b8
12 nulls: 8a
copy: 04 20 02 40 10
ref(38): 00 00 03 -> ref 101nssss 0 4/11nnnkkk 1 3: a4 cb
copy: 01 e8
ref(24): 20 02 0d b8 00 00 00 00
-> ref 101nssss 0 2/11nnnkkk 6 0: a2 f0
copy: 02 21 03
ref(84): 00 01 00 00 00 -> ref 101nssss 0 9/11nnnkkk 3 7: a9 df
ref(40): 00 20 02 0d b8 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
-> ref 101nssss 1 3/11nnnkkk 2 4: b3 d4
ref(120): ff fe 00 11 22
-> ref 101nssss 0 14/11nnnkkk 3 3: ae db
Compressed:
0c 86 00 55 c9 40 00 0f a0 1c 5a 38 17 80 06 07
d0 01 01 11 22 82 06 03 04 40 40 ff ff c0 d0 82
04 20 02 0d b8 8a 04 20 02 40 10 a4 cb 01 e8 a2
f0 02 21 03 a9 df b3 d4 ae db
Was 96 bytes; compressed to 58 bytes, compression factor 1.66
Figure 9: An ND router advertisement
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4. Integrating 6LoWPAN-GHC into 6LoWPAN-HC
6LoWPAN-GHC is intended to plug in as an NHC format for 6LoWPAN-HC
[I-D.ietf-6lowpan-hc]. This section shows how this can be done
(without supplying the detailed normative text yet, although it could
be implemented from this page).
GHC is by definition generic and can be applied to different kinds of
packets. All the examples given above are for ICMPv6 packets; it is
trivial to define an NHC format for ICMPv6 based on GHC.
In addition it may be useful to include an NHC format for UDP, as
many headerlike payloads (e.g., DHCPv6) are carried in UDP.
[I-D.ietf-6lowpan-hc] already defines an NHC format for UDP
(11110CPP). What remains to be done is to define an analogous NHC
byte formatted, e.g. as shown in Figure 10, and simply reference the
existing specification, indicating that for 0b11010cpp NHC bytes, the
UDP payload is not supplied literally but compressed by 6LoWPAN-GHC.
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
| 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | C | P |
+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
Figure 10: A possible NHC byte for UDP GHC
To stay in the same general numbering space, we propose 0b11011111 as
the NHC byte for ICMPv6 GHC.
4.1. Compressing extension headers
If the compression of specific extension headers is considered
desirable, this can be added in a similar way, e.g. as in Figure 11
(however, probably only EID 0 to 3 need to be assigned). As there is
no easy way to extract the length field from the GHC-encoded header
before decoding, this would make detecting the end of the extension
header somewhat complex. The easiest (and most efficient) approach
is to completely elide the length field (in the same way NHC already
elides the next header field in certain cases) and reconstruct it
only on decompression. Instead, the reserved bytecode 0b10010000
would be assigned as a stop marker.
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
| 1 | 0 | 1 | 1 | EID |NH |
+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
Figure 11: A possible NHC byte for extension header GHC
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4.2. Indicating GHC capability
The 6LoWPAN baseline includes just [RFC4944], [I-D.ietf-6lowpan-hc],
[I-D.ietf-6lowpan-nd] (see [I-D.bormann-6lowpan-roadmap]). To enable
the use of GHC, 6LoWPAN nodes need to know that their neighbors
implement it. While this can simply be administratively required, a
transition strategy as well as a way to support mixed networks is
required.
One way to know a neighbor does implement GHC is receiving a packet
from that neighbor with GHC in it ("implicit capability detection").
However, there needs to be a way to bootstrap this, as nobody ever
would start sending packets with GHC otherwise.
To minimize the impact on [I-D.ietf-6lowpan-nd], we propose adding an
ND option 6LoWPAN Capability Indication (6CIO), as illustrated in
Figure 12.
0 1 2 3
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| Type | Length = 1 |_____________________________|G|
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
|_______________________________________________________________|
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
Figure 12: 6LoWPAN Capability Indication (6CIO)
The G bit indicates whether the node sending the option is GHC
capable.
The 6CIO option will typically only be sent in 6LoWPAN-ND RS packets;
the resulting 6LoWPAN-ND RA can already make use of GHC and thus
indicate GHC capability implicitly, which in turn allows the nodes to
use GHC in the 6LoWPAN-ND NS/NA exchange.
6CIO can also be used for future options that need to be negotiated
between 6LoWPAN peers; an IANA registry will administrate the flags.
(Bits marked by underscores in Figure 12 are reserved for future
allocation, i.e., they MUST be sent as zero and MUST be ignored on
reception until allocated. Length values larger than 1 MUST be
supported for future extensions; the additional bits in the option
are then reserved in the same way. For the purposes of the IANA
registry, the bits are numbered in msb-first order from the 16th bit
of the option onwards, i.e., the G bit is flag number 15.)
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5. IANA considerations
In the IANA registry for the 6LOWPAN_NHC header type, IANA would need
to add the assignments in Figure 13.
10110IIN: Extension header GHC*) [RFCthis]
11010CPP: UDP GHC [RFCthis]
11011111: ICMPv6 GHC [RFCthis]
Figure 13: IANA assignments for the NHC byte
*) if the functionality of Section 4.1 is made part of this document.
An IANA registry is needed for 6LoWPAN capability flags. (Policy
TBD.)
IANA needs to allocate an ND option number for 6CIO.
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6. Security considerations
The security considerations of [RFC4944] and [I-D.ietf-6lowpan-hc]
apply. As usual in protocols with packet parsing/construction, care
must be taken in implementations to avoid buffer overflows and in
particular (with respect to the back-referencing) out-of-area
references during decompression.
One additional consideration is that an attacker may send a forged
packet that makes a second node believe a third victim node is GHC-
capable. If it is not, this may prevent packets sent by the second
node from reaching the third node.
No mitigation is proposed (or known) for this attack, except that a
node that does implement GHC is not vulnerable. However, with
unsecured ND, a number of attacks with similar outcomes are already
possible, so there is little incentive to make use of this additional
attack. With secured ND, 6CIO is also secured; nodes relying on
secured ND therefore should use 6CIO bidirectionally (and limit the
implicit capability detection to secured ND packets carrying GHC)
instead of basing their neighbor capability assumptions on receiving
any kind of unprotected packet.
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7. Acknowledgements
Colin O'Flynn has repeatedly insisted that some form of compression
for ICMPv6 and ND packets might be beneficial. He actually wrote his
own draft, [I-D.oflynn-6lowpan-icmphc], which compresses better, but
addresses basic ICMPv6/ND only and needs a much longer spec (around
17 pages of detailed spec, as compared to the single page of core
spec here). This motivated the author to try something simple, yet
general. Special thanks go to Colin for indicating that he indeed
considers his draft superseded by the present one.
The examples given are based on pcap files that Colin O'Flynn and
Owen Kirby provided.
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8. References
8.1. Normative References
[I-D.ietf-6lowpan-hc]
Hui, J. and P. Thubert, "Compression Format for IPv6
Datagrams in Low Power and Lossy Networks (6LoWPAN)",
draft-ietf-6lowpan-hc-15 (work in progress),
February 2011.
[I-D.ietf-6lowpan-nd]
Shelby, Z., Chakrabarti, S., and E. Nordmark, "Neighbor
Discovery Optimization for Low-power and Lossy Networks",
draft-ietf-6lowpan-nd-15 (work in progress),
December 2010.
[RFC2119] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, March 1997.
[RFC2460] Deering, S. and R. Hinden, "Internet Protocol, Version 6
(IPv6) Specification", RFC 2460, December 1998.
[RFC4944] Montenegro, G., Kushalnagar, N., Hui, J., and D. Culler,
"Transmission of IPv6 Packets over IEEE 802.15.4
Networks", RFC 4944, September 2007.
8.2. Informative References
[I-D.bormann-6lowpan-roadmap]
Bormann, C., "6LoWPAN Roadmap and Implementation Guide",
draft-bormann-6lowpan-roadmap-00 (work in progress),
March 2011.
[I-D.ietf-core-link-format]
Shelby, Z., "CoRE Link Format",
draft-ietf-core-link-format-02 (work in progress),
December 2010.
[I-D.oflynn-6lowpan-icmphc]
O'Flynn, C., "ICMPv6/ND Compression for 6LoWPAN Networks",
draft-oflynn-6lowpan-icmphc-00 (work in progress),
July 2010.
[RFC1951] Deutsch, P., "DEFLATE Compressed Data Format Specification
version 1.3", RFC 1951, May 1996.
[RFC3095] Bormann, C., Burmeister, C., Degermark, M., Fukushima, H.,
Hannu, H., Jonsson, L-E., Hakenberg, R., Koren, T., Le,
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K., Liu, Z., Martensson, A., Miyazaki, A., Svanbro, K.,
Wiebke, T., Yoshimura, T., and H. Zheng, "RObust Header
Compression (ROHC): Framework and four profiles: RTP, UDP,
ESP, and uncompressed", RFC 3095, July 2001.
[RFC5795] Sandlund, K., Pelletier, G., and L-E. Jonsson, "The RObust
Header Compression (ROHC) Framework", RFC 5795,
March 2010.
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Author's Address
Carsten Bormann
Universitaet Bremen TZI
Postfach 330440
Bremen D-28359
Germany
Phone: +49-421-218-63921
Fax: +49-421-218-7000
Email: cabo@tzi.org
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