NETLMM Working Group V. Devarapalli (ed.)
Internet-Draft WiChorus
Intended status: Standards Track R. Koodli (ed.)
Expires: April 3, 2009 Starent Networks
H. Lim
N. Kant
Stoke
S. Krishnan
Ericsson
J. Laganier
DOCOMO Euro-Labs
September 30, 2008
Heartbeat Mechanism for Proxy Mobile IPv6
draft-ietf-netlmm-pmipv6-heartbeat-01.txt
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Abstract
Proxy Mobile IPv6 is a network-based mobility management protocol.
The mobility entities involved in the Proxy Mobile IPv6 protocol, the
Mobile Access Gateway (MAG) and the Local Mobility Anchor (LMA),
setup tunnels dynamically to manage mobility for a mobile node within
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the Proxy Mobile IPv6 domain. This document describes a heartbeat
mechanism between the MAG and the LMA to detect failures quickly and
take appropriate action.
Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
2. Terminology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3. Heartbeat Mechanism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3.1. Failure Detection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
3.2. Restart Detection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
3.3. Heartbeat Message . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
3.4. Restart Counter Mobility Option . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
4. Exchanging Heartbeat Messages over an IPv4 Transport
Network . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
5. Configuration Variables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
6. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
7. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
8. Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
9. References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
9.1. Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
9.2. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
Authors' Addresses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Intellectual Property and Copyright Statements . . . . . . . . . . 11
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1. Introduction
Proxy Mobile IPv6 [2] enables network-based mobility for IPv6 hosts
that do not implement any mobility protocols. The protocol is
described in detail in [2]. In order to facilitate the network-based
mobility, the PMIPv6 protocol defines a Mobile Access Gateway (MAG),
which acts as a proxy for the Mobile IPv6 [6] signaling, and the
Local Mobility Anchor (LMA) which acts similar to a Home Agent,
anchoring a Mobile Node's sessions within a Proxy Mobile IPv6
(PMIPv6) domain. The LMA and the MAG establish a bidirectional
tunnel for forwarding all data traffic belonging to the Mobile Nodes.
In a distributed environment such as a PMIPv6 domain consisting of
LMA and MAGs, it is necessary for the nodes to 1) have a consistent
state about each others reachability, and 2) quickly inform peers in
the event of recovery from node failures. So, when the LMA restarts
after a failure, the MAG should (quickly) learn about the restart so
that it could take appropriate actions (such as releasing any
resources). When there are no failures, a MAG should know about
LMA's reachability (and vice versa) so that the path can be assumed
to be functioning.
This document specifies a heartbeat mechanism between the MAG and the
LMA to detect the status of reachability between them. This document
also specifies a mechanism to indicate node restarts; the mechanism
could be used to quickly inform peers of such restarts. The
heartbeat message is a mobility header message (protocol type 135)
which is periodically exchanged at a configurable threshold of time
or sent unsolicited soon after a node restart. This document does
not specify the specific actions (such as releasing resources) that a
node takes as a response to processing the heartbeat messages.
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 [1].
3. Heartbeat Mechanism
The MAG and the LMA exchange heartbeat messages every
HEARTBEAT_INTERVAL seconds to detect the current status of
reachability between them. The MAG initiates the heartbeat exchange
to test if the LMA is reachable by sending a Heartbeat Request
message to the LMA. Each Heartbeat Request contains a sequence
number that is incremented monotonically. The sequence number on the
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last Heartbeat Request message is always recorded by the MAG, and is
used to match the corresponding Heartbeat Response. Similarly, the
LMA also initiates a heartbeat exchange with the MAG, by sending a
Heartbeat Request message, to check if the MAG is reachable. The
format of the Heartbeat message is described in Section 3.3.
A Heartbeat Request message can be sent only if the MAG has at least
one proxy binding cache entry at the LMA for a mobile node attached
to the MAG. If there are no proxy binding cache entries at the LMA
for any of the mobile nodes attached to the MAG, then the heartbeat
message MUST NOT be sent. Similarly, the LMA MUST NOT send a
Heartbeat Request message to a MAG if there is no active binding
cache entry created by the MAG. A PMIPv6 node SHOULD always respond
to a Heartbeat Request message with a Heartbeat Response message,
irrespective of whether there is an active binding cache entry.
The HEARTBEAT_INTERVAL SHOULD NOT be configured to a value less than
30 seconds. Sending heartbeat messages too often may become an
overhead on the path between the MAG and the LMA. The
HEARTBEAT_INTERVAL can be set to a much larger value on the LMA, if
required, to reduce of burden of sending periodic heartbeat messages.
If the LMA or the MAG do not support the heartbeat messages, they
should respond with an ICMP Parameter Problem, Code 0, message to the
initiator. The 'Pointer' field in the ICMP Parameter Problem message
SHOULD point to the 'MH Type' field, indicating that the particular
Mobility Header message is not supported. When the ICMP Parameter
Problem message is received in response to Heartbeat Request message,
the initiating MAG or the LMA MUST NOT use heartbeat messages with
the other end again.
3.1. Failure Detection
A PMIPv6 node, (MAG or LMA) matches every received Heartbeat Response
to the Heartbeat Request sent using the sequence number. Before
sending the next Heartbeat Request, it increments a local variable
MISSING_HEARTBEAT if it has not received a Heartbeat Response for the
previous request. When this local variable MISSING_HEARTBEAT exceeds
a configurable parameter MISSING_HEARTBEATS_ALLOWED, the PMIPv6 node
concludes that the peer PMIPv6 node is not reachable. The PMIPv6
node may then take appropriate actions which are outside the scope of
this document. If a Heartbeat Response message is received, the
MISSING_HEARTBEATS counter is reset.
3.2. Restart Detection
The section describes a mechanism for detecting failure recovery
without session persistence. In case the LMA or the MAG crashes and
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re-boots and loses all state with respect to the PMIPv6 sessions, it
would be beneficial for the peer PMIPv6 node to discover the failure
and the loss of session state and establish the sessions again.
Each PMIPv6 node (both the MAG and LMA) MUST maintain a monotonically
increasing Restart Counter that is incremented every time the node
re-boots and looses PMIPv6 session state. The counter MUST NOT be
incremented if the recovery happens without losing state for the
PMIPv6 sessions active at the time of failure. This counter MUST be
stored in non-volatile memory. A PMIPv6 node includes a Restart
Counter mobility option, described in Section 3.4 in an Heartbeat
Response message to indicate the current value of the Restart
Counter. Each PMIPv6 node MUST also store the Restart Counter for
all the peer PMIPv6 nodes that it has sessions with currently.
Storing the Restart Counter values for peer PMIPv6 nodes does not
require non-volatile memory.
The PMIPv6 node that receives the Heartbeat Response message compares
the Restart Counter value with the previously received value. If the
value is different, the receiving node assumes that the peer PMIPv6
node had crashed and recovered. If the Restart Counter value changes
or if there was no previously stored value, the new value is stored
by the receiving PMIPv6 node.
If a PMIPv6 node restarts and looses PMIPv6 session state, it SHOULD
send an unsolicited Heartbeat Response message with an incremented
Restart Counter to all the PMIPv6 nodes that had previously
established PMIPv6 sessions. This allows the peer PMIPv6 nodes to
quickly discover the restart. The sequence number field in the
unsolicited Heartbeat Response is ignored and no response to
necessary; the nodes will synchronize during the next Request and
Response exchange.
3.3. Heartbeat Message
The following illustrates the message format for the Heartbeat
Mobility Header message. The 'MH Type' field in the Mobility Header
indicates that it is a Heartbeat message.
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
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| Reserved |U|R|
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| Sequence Number |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
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Reserved
Set to 0 and ignored by the receiver.
'R'
A 1-bit flag that indicates whether the message is a request or a
response. When the 'R' flag is set to 0, it indicates that the
Heartbeat message is a request. When the 'R' flag is set to 1, it
indicates that the Heartbeat message is a response.
'U'
Set to 1 in Unsolicited Heartbeat Response. Otherwise set to 0.
Sequence Number
A 32-bit sequence number used for matching the request to the
reply.
3.4. Restart Counter Mobility Option
The following shows the message format for a new mobility option for
carrying the Restart Counter Value in the Heartbeat message. The
Restart Counter Mobility Option is only valid in a Heartbeat Response
message. It has an alignment requirement of 4n+2.
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 |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| Restart Counter |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
Type
A 8-bit field that indicates that it is a Restart Counter mobility
option.
Length
A 8-bit field that indicates the length of the option in octets
excluding the 'Type' and 'Length' fields. It is set to '4'.
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Restart Counter
A 32-bit field that indicates the current Restart Counter value.
4. Exchanging Heartbeat Messages over an IPv4 Transport Network
In some deployments, the network between the MAG and the LMA may not
be capable of transporting IPv6 packets. In this case, the Heartbeat
messages are tunneled over IPv4. If the Proxy Binding Update and
Proxy Binding Acknowledgment messages are sent using UDP
encapsulation to traverse NATs, then the Heartbeat messages are also
sent with UDP encapsulation. The UDP port used would be the same as
the port used for the Proxy Binding Update and Proxy Binding
Acknowledgement messages. For more details on tunneling Proxy Mobile
IPv6 signaling messages over IPv4, see [3].
5. Configuration Variables
The LMA and the MAG must allow the following variables to be
configurable.
HEARTBEAT_INTERVAL
This variable is used to set the time interval in seconds between
two consecutive Heartbeat Request messages. The default value is
60 seconds. It SHOULD not be set to less than 30 seconds.
MISSING_HEARTBEATS_ALLOWED
This variable indicates the maximum number of consecutive
Heartbeat Request messages that a PMIPv6 node can miss before
concluding that the peer PMIPv6 node is not reachable. The
default value for this variable is 3.
6. Security Considerations
The heartbeat messages are just used for checking reachability
between the MAG and the LMA. They do not carry information that is
useful for eavesdroppers on the path. Therefore, confidentiality
protection is not required. Integrity protection using IPsec [4] for
the heartbeat messages MUST be supported on the MAG and the LMA.
If dynamic key negotiation between the MAG and the LMA is required,
IKEv2 [5] should be used.
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7. IANA Considerations
The Heartbeat message defined in Section 3.3 must have the type value
allocated from the same space as the 'MH Type' field in the Mobility
Header defined in RFC 3775 [6].
The Restart Counter mobility option defined in Section 3.4 must have
the type value allocated from the same space as the Mobility Options
defined in RFC 3775 [6].
8. Acknowledgments
A heartbeat mechanism for a network-based mobility management
protocol was first described in [7]. The authors would like to thank
the members of a NETLMM design team that produced that document. The
mechanism described in this document also derives from the path
management mechanism described in [8].
We would like to thank Alessio Casati for first suggesting a fault
handling mechanism for Proxy Mobile IPv6.
9. References
9.1. Normative References
[1] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate Requirement
Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, March 1997.
[2] Gundavelli, S., Leung, K., Devarapalli, V., Chowdhury, K., and
B. Patil, "Proxy Mobile IPv6", RFC 5213, August 2008.
[3] Wakikawa, R. and S. Gundavelli, "IPv4 Support for Proxy Mobile
IPv6", draft-ietf-netlmm-pmip6-ipv4-support-04 (work in
progress), July 2008.
[4] Kent, S. and K. Seo, "Security Architecture for the Internet
Protocol", RFC 4301, December 2005.
[5] Kaufman, C., "Internet Key Exchange (IKEv2) Protocol", RFC 4306,
December 2005.
9.2. Informative References
[6] Johnson, D., Perkins, C., and J. Arkko, "Mobility Support in
IPv6", RFC 3775, June 2004.
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[7] Giaretta, G., "The NetLMM Protocol",
draft-giaretta-netlmm-dt-protocol-02 (work in progress),
October 2006.
[8] 3rd Generation Partnership Project, "3GPP Technical
Specification 29.060 V7.6.0: "Technical Specification Group Core
Network and Terminals; General Packet Radio Service (GPRS); GPRS
Tunnelling Protocol (GTP) across the Gn and Gp interface
(Release 7)"", July 2007.
Authors' Addresses
Vijay Devarapalli
WiChorus
3950 North First Street
San Jose, CA 95134
USA
Email: vijay@wichorus.com
Rajeev Koodli
Starent Networks
USA
Email: rkoodli@starentnetworks.com
Heeseon Lim
Stoke
5403 Betsy Ross Drve
Santa Clara, CA 95054
USA
Email: hlim@stoke.com
Nishi Kant
Stoke
5403 Betsy Ross Drive
Santa Clara, CA 95054
USA
Email: nishi@stoke.com
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Suresh Krishnan
Ericsson
8400 Decarie Blvd.
Town of Mount Royal, QC
Canada
Email: suresh.krishnan@ericsson.com
Julien Laganier
DOCOMO Euro-Labs
Landsbergerstrasse 312
Munich, D-80687
Germany
Email: julien.IETF@laposte.net
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