INTERNET DRAFT                                     R. Boivie, N. Feldman
<draft-ooms-xcast-basic-spec-01.txt>                                 IBM
                                                                 Y. Imai
                                                                 Fujitsu
                                                               W. Livens
                                                            Colt Telecom
                                                   D. Ooms, O. Paridaens
                                                                 Alcatel
                                                             March, 2001
                                                 Expires September, 2001

             Explicit Multicast (Xcast) Basic Specification


Status of this Memo

   This document is an Internet-Draft and is in full conformance with
   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 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.


Abstract

   Multicast has become increasingly important with the emergence of
   network-based applications such as IP telephony and video
   conferencing. The Internet community has done a significant amount of
   work on IP multicast over the last decade [1075, 2201, 2236, DEER,
   DEE2, FARI, HOLB, MBONE, PERL].

   However, while traditional multicast schemes are scalable in the
   sense that they can support very large multicast groups, there are
   scalability issues when a network needs to support a very large
   number of distinct multicast groups.



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   This document describes a new scheme for multicast - named Explicit
   Multicast (Xcast) - that complements the existing schemes. Whereas
   the existing schemes can support a limited number of very large
   multicast sessions, Xcast can support a very large number of small
   multicast sessions.  This is achieved by explicitly encoding the list
   of destinations in the data packets, instead of using a multicast
   address.

   The co-operation of Xcast - a data plane mechanism - with existing
   control planes is described and scenarios for gradual deployment are
   investigated.  Encodings for both IPv4 and IPv6 are proposed.

   This draft merges three earlier drafts ([BOIV], [IMAI], [OOMS]).


Table of Contents

   1. Introduction
   2. Overview Xcast
   3. The cost of the traditional multicast schemes
   4. Motivation
   5. Application
   6. Flexibility Xcast
   7. Control plane
   7.1. SIP
   7.2. Receiver Initiated Join model
   8. Optional information
   8.1. List of ports
   8.2. List of DSCPs
   8.3. Channel Identifier
   9. Encoding
   9.1. General
   9.2. IPv4
   9.2.1. IPv4 header
   9.2.2. Xcast4 header
   9.3. IPv6
   9.3.1. IPv6 header
   9.3.2. Xcast6 header
   9.3.2.1. Routing Extension header
   9.3.2.2. Destination Extension header
   10. Impact on Upper Layer Protocols
   10.1. Checksum calculation in UDP and ICMP
   10.2. IPsec Authentication header
   11. Gradual Deployment
   11.1. Tunneling
   11.2. Premature X2U
   11.3. Semi-permeable tunneling (IPv6 only)
   11.4. Special case: deployment without network support



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   12. (Socket) API
   13. Security Considerations
   References

   Changes:
   00->01: - added Channel Identifier in Xcast header
           - cleaned up wording (traditional, current, today's mc)
           - added definition of Session and Channel



1. Introduction

   Multicast, the ability to efficiently send data to a group of
   destinations, is becoming increasingly important for applications
   such as IP telephony and video-conferencing.

   There seem to be two kinds of multicast that are important: a
   broadcast-like multicast that sends data to a very large number of
   destinations and a "narrowcast" multicast that sends data to a fairly
   small group. An example of the first is the audio & video
   multicasting of a working group session from an IETF meeting to sites
   all around the world. An example of the second is a videoconference
   involving 3 or 4 parties. For reasons described below, it seems
   prudent to use different mechanisms for these two cases. As the
   reliable multicast transport group has stated: "it is believed that a
   'one size fits all' protocol will be unable to meet the requirements
   of all applications" [RMT].

   Multicast can be used to minimize bandwidth consumption.  Explicit
   Multicast (Xcast) also can be used to minimize bandwidth consumption
   for "small groups".  But it has an additional advantage as well.
   Xcast eliminates the per session signaling and per session state
   information of traditional multicast schemes and this allows Xcast to
   support very large numbers of multicast sessions.  And this
   scalability is important since it enables important classes of
   applications such as IP telephony, videoconferencing, collaborative
   applications, networked games etc. where the number of simultaneous
   multicast sessions can be very large and the number of members in a
   group is small.


2. Overview Xcast

   In this document following terminology will be used:

   - Session: in Xcast the term 'multicast session' will be used instead
   of 'multicast group' to avoid the strong association of multicast



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   group with multicast group addresses in traditional IP multicast.

   - Channel: in a session with multiple senders (e.g. a video
   conference), the flow sourced by one sender will be called a channel.
   So a session can contain one or more channels.

   In the Host Group Model the packet carries a multicast address as a
   logical identifier of all group members.  In Xcast, the source node
   keeps track of the destinations in the multicast channel that it
   wants to send packets to.

   The source encodes the list of destinations in the Xcast header, and
   then sends the packet to a router. Each router along the way parses
   the header, partitions the destinations based on each destination's
   next hop, and forwards a packet with an appropriate Xcast header to
   each of the next hops.

   When there is only one destination left, the Xcast packet could turn
   into a normal unicast packet, which can be unicasted along the
   remainder of the route.  This is called X2U (Xcast to Unicast).

   For example, suppose that A is trying to get packets distributed to
   B, C & D in Figure 1 below:


                                   R4 ---- B
                                  /
                                 /
        A----- R1 ---- R2 ---- R3                      R8 ---- C
                                 \                    /
                                  \                  /
                                   R5 ---- R6 ---- R7
                                                    \
                                                     \
                                                       R9 ---- D
                                 Figure 1

   This is accomplished as follows: A sends an Xcast packet with the
   list of destinations in its Xcast header to the first router, R1.

   Since the Xcast header will be slightly different for IPv4 and IPv6
   we won't reveal any details on the encoding of the Xcast header in
   this section (see section 9).  So, ignoring the details, the packet
   that A sends to R1 looks like this:

       [ src = A | dest = B C D | payload ]

   When R1 receives this packet, it needs to properly process the Xcast



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   header. The processing that a router does on receiving one of these
   Xcast packets is as follows:

   - Perform a route table lookup to determine the next hop for each of
   the destinations listed in the packet.

   - Partition the set of destinations based on their next hops.

   - Replicate the packet so that there's one copy of the packet for
   each of the next hops found in the previous steps.

   - Modify the list of destinations in each of the copies so that the
   list in the copy for a given next hop includes just the destinations
   that ought to be routed through that next hop.

   - Send the modified copies of the packet on to the next hops.

   - Optimization: If there is only one destination for a particular
   next hop, send the packet as a standard unicast packet to the
   destination (X2U), as there is no multicast gain by formatting it as
   an Xcast packet.

   So, in the example above, R1 will send a single packet on to R2 with
   a destination list of < B C D > and R2 will send a single packet to
   R3 with the same destination list.

   When R3 receives the packet, it will, by the algorithm above, send
   one copy of the packet to destination R5 with an Xcast list of < C D
   >, and one ordinary unicast packet addressed to < B >. R4 will
   receive a standard unicast packet and forward it on to < B >. R5 will
   forward the Xcast packet that it receives on to R6 which will pass it
   on to R7. When the packet reaches R7, R7 will transmit ordinary
   unicast packets addressed to < C > and < D > respectively. R8 and R9
   will receive standard unicast packets, and forward the packets on to
   < C > and < D > respectively.

   It's important that the Xcast packet that is sent to a given next hop
   only includes destinations for which that next hop is the next hop
   listed in the route table. If the list of destinations in the packet
   sent to R4, for example, had also included C and D, R4 would send
   duplicate packets.

   Note that when routing topology changes, the routing for an Xcast
   channel will automatically adapt to the new topology since the path
   an Xcast packet takes to a given destination always follows the
   ordinary, unicast routing for that destination.





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3. The cost of the traditional multicast schemes

   Traditional multicast schemes [DEER, DEE2, FARI] were designed to
   handle very large multicast groups. These work well if one is trying
   to distribute broadcast-like channels all around the world but they
   have scalability problems when there is a very large number of
   groups.

   The characteristics of the traditional IP multicast model are
   determined by its two components: the Host Group model [DEER] and a
   Multicast Routing Protocol.  Both components add to the difference in
   nature between unicast and multicast.

   In the Host Group model, a group of hosts is identified by a
   multicast group address, which is used both for subscriptions and
   forwarding. This model has two main costs:

      - Multicast address allocation: The creator of a multicast group
      must allocate a multicast address which is unique in its scope
      (scope will often be global).  This issue is being addressed by
      the Malloc working group, which is proposing a set of Multicast
      Address Allocation Servers (MAAS) and three protocols (MASC, AAP,
      MADCAP).

      - Destination unawareness: When a multicast packet arrives in a
      router, the router can determine the next hops for the packet, but
      knows nothing about the ultimate destinations of the packet, nor
      about how many times the packet will be duplicated later on in the
      network. This complicates the security, accounting and policy
      functions.

   In addition to the Host Group model, a routing algorithm is required
   to maintain the member state and the delivery tree.  This can be done
   using a (truncated) broadcast algorithm or a multicast algorithm
   [DEER].  Since the former consumes too much bandwidth by
   unnecessarily forwarding packets to some routers, only the multicast
   algorithms are considered.  These multicast routing protocols have
   the following costs:

      - Connection state: The multicast routing protocols exchange
      messages that create state for each (source, multicast group) in
      all the routers that are part of the point-to-multipoint tree.
      This can be viewed as signaling that creates multicast connection
      state, possibly yielding huge multicast forwarding tables.  Some
      of these schemes even disseminate this multicast routing
      information to places where it isn't necessarily needed [1075].
      Other schemes try to limit the amount of multicast routing
      information that needs to be disseminated, processed and stored



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      throughout the network. These schemes (e.g. [2201]) use a "shared
      distribution tree" that is shared by all the members of a
      multicast group and they try to limit the distribution of
      multicast routing information to just those nodes that "really
      need it". But these schemes also have problems. Because of the
      shared tree, they use less than optimal paths in routing packets
      to their destinations and they tend to concentrate traffic in
      small portions of a network.

      - Source advertisement mechanism: Multicast routing protocols
      provide a mechanism by which members get 'connected' to the
      sources for a certain group without knowing the sources
      themselves. In sparse-mode protocols [2201, DEE2], this is
      achieved by having a core node, which needs to be advertised in
      the complete domain. On the other hand, in dense-mode protocols
      [1075] this is achieved by a "flood and prune" mechanism. Both
      approaches raise additional scalability issues.

      - Interdomain routing: Multicast routing protocols that rely on a
      core node [2201, DEE2] additionally need an interdomain multicast
      routing protocol (e.g. [FARI]).

   The cost of multicast address allocation, destination unawareness and
   the above scalability issues lead to a search for other multicast
   schemes.  Source-Specific Multicast (SSM) [HOLB] addresses some of
   the above drawbacks: in SSM a host joins a specific source, thus the
   channel is identified by the couple (source address, multicast
   address).  This approach avoids multicast address allocation as well
   as the need for an interdomain routing protocol.  The source
   advertisement is taken out of the multicast routing protocol and is
   moved to an out-of-band mechanism (e.g. web page).

   Note that SSM still creates state and signaling per multicast channel
   in each on-tree node.  Figure 2 depicts the above costs as a function
   of the number of members in the session or channel.  All the costs
   have a hyperbolic behavior.















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         cost of the traditional
             multicast model
               per member
                    ^
                    | costly|  OK
                    | <-----|----->
                    |  .    |
                    |   ..  |
                    |     ..|..
                    |       |  .........
                    |       |           ........
                    +--------------------------->
                        |                 number of members
                        v
                 alternative=Xcast
                                 Figure 2

   The traditional multicast model becomes expensive for its members if
   the groups are small.  Small groups are typical for conferencing,
   gaming and collaborative applications.  These applications are well-
   served by Xcast.

   In practice, traditional multicast routing protocols impose
   limitations on the number of groups and the size of the network in
   which they are deployed.  For Xcast these limitations do not exist.


4. Motivation

   Xcast takes advantage of one of the fundamental tenets of the
   Internet "philosophy", namely that one should move complexity to the
   edges of the network and keep the middle of the network simple. This
   is the principle that guided the design of IP and TCP and it's the
   principle that has made the incredible growth of the Internet
   possible. For example, one reason that the Internet has been able to
   scale so well is that the routers in the core of the network deal
   with large CIDR blocks as opposed to individual hosts or individual
   "connections". The routers in the core don't need to keep track of
   the individual TCP connections that are passing through them.
   Similarly, the IETF's diffserv effort is based on the idea that the
   routers shouldn't have to keep track of a large number of individual
   RSVP flows that might be passing through them. It's the authors'
   belief that the routers in the core shouldn't have to keep track of a
   large number of individual  multicast flows either.

   Compared to traditional multicast, Xcast has the following
   advantages:




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   1) Routers do not have to maintain state per session (or per channel)
   [SOLA].  This makes Xcast very scalable in terms of the number of
   sessions that can be supported since the nodes in the network do not
   need to disseminate or store any multicast routing information for
   these sessions.

   2) No multicast address allocation required.

   3) No need for multicast routing protocols (neither intra- nor
   interdomain).  Xcast packets always take the "right" path as
   determined by the ordinary unicast routing protocols.

   4) No core node, so no single point of failure.  Unlike the shared
   tree schemes, Xcast minimizes network latency and maximizes network
   "efficiency".

   5) No symmetrical paths required.  Traditional multicast routing
   protocols create non-shortest-path trees if the paths are not
   symmetrical (symmetrical =  the shortest path from A to B is the same
   as the shortest path from B to A).  It is expected that more and more
   paths in the Internet will be asymmetrical due to traffic engineering
   and more policy routing, thus multicast will cause more and more
   deviation from optimal network usage.

   6) Automatic reaction to unicast reroutes.  Xcast will react
   immediately to unicast route changes.  In traditional multicast
   routing protocols a communication between the unicast and the
   multicast routing protocol needs to be established.  In many
   implementations this is on a polling basis, yielding a slower
   reaction to e.g. link failures.  It may also take some time for
   traditional multicast routing protocols to fix things up if there is
   a large number of groups that need to be fixed.

   7) Easy security and accounting.  In contrast with the Host Group
   Model, in Xcast all the sources know the members of the multicast
   channel, which gives the sources the means to e.g. reject certain
   members or count the traffic going to certain members quite easily.
   Not only a source, but also a border router is able to determine how
   many times a packet will be duplicated in its domain.  It also
   becomes easier to restrict the number of senders or the bandwidth per
   sender.

   8) Heterogeneous receivers.  Besides the list of destinations, the
   packet could (optionally) also contain a list of DiffServ CodePoints
   (DSCPs).  While traditional multicast protocols have to create
   separate groups for each service class, Xcast incorporates the
   possibility of having receivers with different service requirements
   within one multicast channel.



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   9) Xcast packets can make use of traffic engineered unicast paths.

   10) Simpler implementation of reliable protocols on top of Xcast,
   because Xcast can easily address a subset of the original list of
   destinations to do a retransmission.

   11) Flexibility (see section 6).

   12) Easier transition mechanisms (see section 11).

   It should be noted that Xcast has a number of disadvantages as well:

   1) Overhead.  Each packet contains all remaining destinations. But,
   the total amount of data is still much less than for unicast (payload
   is only sent once).   A method to compress the list of destination
   addresses might be useful.

   2) More complex header processing.  Each destination in the packet
   needs a routing table lookup.  So an Xcast packet with n destinations
   requires the same number of routing table lookups as n unicast
   headers.  Additionally, a different header has to be constructed per
   next hop.  Remark however that:

      a) Since Xcast will typically be used for super-sparse sessions,
      there will be a limited number of branching points, compared to
      non-branching points.  Only in a branching point new headers need
      to be constructed.

      b) The header construction can be reduced to a very simple
      operation: overwriting a bitmap.

      c) Among the non-branching points, a lot of them will contain only
      one destination.  In these cases normal unicast forwarding can be
      applied.

      d) By using a hierarchical encoding of the list of destinations in
      combination with the aggregation in the forwarding tables the
      forwarding can be accelerated ([OOMS]).

      e) When the packet enters a region of the network where link
      bandwidth is not an issue anymore, the packet can be transformed
      by a Premature X2U.  Premature X2U (see section 11.2) occurs when
      a router decides to transform the Xcast packet for one or more
      destinations into unicast packets.  This avoids more complex
      processing downstream.

      f) Other mechanisms to reduce the processing have been described
      in [IMAI] (tractable list) and [OOMS] (caching), but are not (yet)



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      part of this basic Xcast specification.

   3) Xcast only works with a limited number of receivers.


5. Application

   While Xcast is not suitable for multicast sessions with a large
   number of members, such as the broadcast of an IETF meeting, it does
   provide an important complement to existing multicast schemes in that
   it can support very large numbers of small sessions.  So Xcast covers
   a very important class of applications: conferencing, multi-player
   games, collaborative working, etc.  The number of these sessions will
   become huge.

   Some may argue that it is not worthwhile to use multicast for
   sessions with a limited number of members, and use unicast instead.
   But in some cases limited bandwidth in the "last mile" makes it
   important to have some form of multicast as the following example
   illustrates. Assume n residential users that set up a video
   conference.  Typically access technologies are asymmetric (e.g. xDSL,
   GPRS or cable modem).  So, a host with xDSL has no problem receiving
   n-1 basic 100kb/s video channels, but the host is not able to send
   its own video data n-1 times at this rate.  Because of the limited
   and often asymmetric access capacity, some type of multicast is
   mandatory.

   A simple but important application of Xcast lies in bridging the
   access link.  The host sends the Xcast packet with the list of
   unicast addresses and the first router performs a Premature X2U.

   Since Xcast is not suitable for large groups, Xcast will not replace
   the traditional multicast model, but it does offer an alternative for
   multipoint-to-multipoint communications when there can be very large
   numbers of small sessions.


6. Flexibility Xcast

   The main goal of multicast is to avoid duplicate information flowing
   over the same link.  By using traditional multicast instead of
   unicast, bandwidth consumption decreases while the state and
   signaling per session increases.  Apart from these two dimensions, we
   identify a third one: the header processing per packet.  This three
   dimensional space is depicted in Figure 3.






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             state&signaling
               per session
                in router
                    ^
                    |
                    |
                   ....
                  B |  ....
                  . |      ....
                 .  |          ....
                .   |              ....
               .    +------------------..---> processing
              .    /               .... C     per packet
             .   /            .....           in router
            .  /         .....
           . /      .....
          ./   .....
         /A....
       /
     /
    link bandwidth

                                 Figure 3

   One method of delivering identical information from a source to n
   destinations is to unicast the information n times (A in Figure 3).
   A second method, the traditional multicast model (B in Figure 3)
   sends the information only once to a multicast address.  In Xcast the
   information is sent only once, but the packet contains a list of
   destinations (point C).

   The three points A, B and C define a plane (indicated with dots in
   Figure 3): a plane of conservation of misery.  All three approaches
   have disadvantages.  The link bandwidth is a scarce resource,
   especially in access networks.  State&signaling/session encounters
   limitations when the number of sessions becomes large and an
   increased processing/packet is cumbersome for high link speeds.

   A nice property of Xcast is that a router can make its own tradeoffs.
   Since all information is carried in the packet, Xcast allows the
   router to move in this plane of conservation of misery (Figure 3),
   according to its own needs, which could be, for example, its location
   in the network. Routers could build caches to move from C to B, while
   Premature X2U allows a shift from C to A.


7. Control plane




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   Unlike traditional multicast schemes, Xcast does not specify a
   "control plane". There is no IGMP, and as mentioned above, there are
   no intradomain or interdomain multicast routing protocols. With
   Xcast, the means by which multicast sessions are defined is an
   application level issue and applications are not confined to the
   model in which hosts use IGMP to join a multicast session.  For
   example:

   - some applications might want to use an IGMP-like receiver-join
   model.

   - other applications might want to use a model in which a user places
   a call to the party or parties that he or she wants to talk to
   (similar to the way that one puts together a conference call today
   using the button's on one's telephone).

   - one might define a session based on the cells that are close to a
   moving device in order to provide for a "smooth handoff" between
   cells when the moving device crosses cell boundaries.

   - in some applications the members of the session might be specified
   as arguments on a command line.

   - one might define an application that uses GPS to send video from a
   bank robbery to the 3 police cars that are closest to the bank being
   robbed.

   Thus, the application developer is not limited to the receiver-
   initiated joins of the IGMP model.  There will be multiple ways in
   which an Xcast sender determines the addresses of the members of the
   channel.

   For the purpose of establishing voice and multimedia conferences over
   IP networks, several control planes have already been defined,
   including SIP [2543] and H.323[H323].

7.1. SIP

   In SIP, a host takes the initiative to set up a session.  With the
   assistance of a SIP server a session is created.  The session state
   is kept in the hosts.  Data delivery can be achieved by several
   mechanisms: meshed unicast, bridged or multicast.  Note that for the
   establishment of multicast delivery, a multicast protocol and
   communication with Multicast Address Allocation Servers (MAAS) are
   still required.

   In "meshed unicast" or "multi-unicasting", the application keeps
   track of the participants' unicast addresses and sends a unicast to



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   each of those addresses. For reasons described in section 3, multi-
   unicasting rather than multicast is the prevalent solution in use
   today.  It's a simple matter to replace multi-unicast code with Xcast
   code. All that the developer has to do is replace a loop that sends a
   unicast to each of the participants by a single "xcast_send" that
   sends the data to the participants. Thus it's easy to incorporate
   Xcast into real conferencing applications.

   Both Xcast and SIP address super-sparse multicast sessions.  It turns
   out that Xcast (a very flexible data plane mechanism) can be easily
   integrated with SIP (a very flexible control plane protocol).  When
   an application decides to use Xcast forwarding it does not affect its
   interface to the SIP agent: it can use the same SIP messages as it
   would for multi-unicasting.

7.2 Receiver Initiated Join model

   In the previous section, it was discussed how to establish an Xcast
   session among well known participants of a multi-party conference. In
   some cases, it is useful for participants to be able to join a
   session without being invited. For example, the chairman of a video
   chat may want to leave the door of their meeting open for newcomers.
   The receiver-initiated join model can be implemented, if desired, by
   introducing a server that hosts can talk to to join a conference.


8. Optional information

8.1. List of ports

   Although an extension to SIP could be arranged such that all
   participants in a session use the same transport (UDP) port number,
   in the general case it is possible for each participant to listen on
   a different port number.  To cover this case, the Xcast packet
   optionally contains a list of port numbers.

   If the list of port numbers is present, the destination port number
   in the transport layer header will be set to zero.  On X2U the
   destination port number in the transport layer header will be set to
   the port number corresponding to the destination of the unicast
   packet.

8.2. List of DSCPs

   The Xcast packet could (optionally) also contain a list of DiffServ
   CodePoints (DSCPs).  While traditional multicast protocols have to
   create separate groups for each service class, Xcast incorporates the
   possibility of having receivers with different service requirements



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   within one channel.

   The DSCP in the IP header will be set to the most demanding DSCP of
   the list of DSCPs.  This DSCP in the IP header will determine e.g.
   the scheduler to use.

   If two destinations, with the same next-hop, have 'non-mergable'
   DSCPs, two Xcast packets will be created. 'Non-mergable' meaning that
   one can not say that one is more or less stringent than the other.

8.3. Channel Identifier

   Optionally a sender can decide to add an extra number in the Xcast
   header: the Channel Identifier.  If the source does not want to use
   this option it MUST set the Channel Identifier to zero.  If the
   Channel Identifier is non-zero the pair (Source Address, Channel
   Identifier) MUST uniquely identify the channel (note that this is
   similar to the (S, G) pair in SSM).  This document does not assign
   any other semantics to the Channel Identifier besides the one above.

   This Channel Identifier could be useful for several purposes:

   1) An identifier of the channel in error, flow control, etc. messages

   2) A key to a caching table [OOMS].

   3) It gives an extra de-multiplexing possibility (beside the port-
   number)

   4) ...

9. Encoding

9.1. General

   The source address field of the IP header contains the address of the
   Xcast sender.  The destination address field carries the All-Xcast-
   Routers address (to be assigned link-local multicast address), this
   is to have a fixed value.  Every Xcast router joins this multicast
   group.  The reasons for putting a fixed number in the destination
   field are:

   1) The destination address field is part of the IP pseudo header and
   the latter is covered by transport layer checksums (e.g. UDP
   checksum). So the fixed value avoids a (delta) recalculation of the
   checksum.

   2) The IPsec AH covers the IP header destination address hence



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   preventing any modification to that field.  Also, both AH and ESP
   payloads cover the whole UDP packet (via authentication and/or
   encryption).  The UDP checksum cannot therefore be updated if the IP
   header destination address were to change.

   3) In Xcast for IPv6 the Routing Extension shall be used, this header
   extension is only checked by a router if the packet is destined to
   this router.  This is achieved by making all Xcast routers part of
   the All_Xcast_Routers group.

   4) Normally Xcast packets are only visible to Xcast routers.
   However, if a non-Xcast router receives an Xcast packet by accident
   (or by criminal intent), it will not send ICMP errors since the Xcast
   packet carries a multicast address in the destination address field
   ([1812]).

   Note that some benefits only hold when the multicast address stays in
   the destination field until it reaches the end-node (thus not
   combinable with X2U).

9.2. IPv4

   [AGUI] and [1770] proposed (for a slightly different purpose) to
   carry multiple destinations in the IPv4 option.  But because of the
   limited flexibility (limited size of the header), Xcast will follow
   another approach.  The list of destinations will be encoded in a
   separate header. The Xcast header for IPv4 (in short Xcast4) is
   carried between the IPv4 header and the transport layer header.

         [IPv4 header | Xcast4 | transport header | payload ]

   Note also that since the Xcast header is added to the data portion of
   the packet, if the sender wishes to avoid IP fragmentation, it must
   take the size of the Xcast header into account.

9.2.1. IPv4 header

   The Xcast4 header is carried on top of an IP header.  The IP header
   will carry the protocol number PROTO_Xcast.  The source address field
   contains the address of the Xcast sender.  The destination address
   field carries the All_Xcast_Routers address.

9.2.2. Xcast4 header

   The Xcast4 header is depicted in Figure 4.  It is composed of two
   parts: a fixed part (first 12 octets) and two variable length parts
   that are specified by the fixed part.




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     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
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
     |VERSION|A|X|D|P|R| NBR_OF_DEST |          CHECKSUM             |
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
     |    PROT ID    |    LENGTH     |             RESV              |
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
     |                       CHANNEL IDENTIFIER                      |
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
     |                  List of Addresses and DSCPs                  |
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
     |                  List of Port Numbers (optional)              |
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+

                                 Figure 4

   VERSION = Xcast version number.  This document describes version 1.

   A = Anonymity bit: if this bit is set the destination addresses for
   which the corresponding bit in the bitmap is zero must be overwritten
   by zero.

   X = Xcast bit: if this bit is set a router must not reduce the Xcast
   packet to unicast packet(s), i.e. the packet MUST stay an Xcast
   packet end-to-end.  This bit can be useful when IPsec is applied.

   D = DSCP bit: if this bit is set the packet will contain a DS-byte
   for each destination.

   P = Port bit: if this bit is set the packet will contain a port
   number for each destination.

   NBR_OF_DEST = the number of destinations.

   CHECKSUM = A checksum on the Xcast header only. This is verified and
   recomputed at each point that the Xcast header is processed.  The
   checksum field is the 16 bit one's complement of the one's complement
   sum of all the bytes in the header. For purposes of computing the
   checksum, the value of the checksum field is zero.  It is not clear
   yet whether a checksum is needed (ffs).  If only one destination is
   wrong it can still be useful to forward the packet to N-1 correct
   destinations and 1 incorrect destination.

   PROT ID = specifies the protocol of the following header.

   LENGTH = length of the Xcast header in 4-octet words.  This field
   puts an upper boundary to the number of destinations.  This value is
   also determined by the NBR_OF_DEST field and the D and P bits.



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   RESV = R = Reserved. It must be zero on transmission and must be
   ignored on receipt.

   CHANNEL IDENTIFIER = 4 octets Channel Identifier (see section 8.3).

   The first variable part is the 'List of Addresses and DSCPs', the
   second variable part is the 'List of Port Numbers'.  Both are 4-octet
   aligned.  The second variable part is only present if the P-bit is
   set.

   Figure 5 gives an example of the variable part for the case that the
   P-bit is set and the D-bit is cleared (in this example N is odd):

     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
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
     |                            BITMAP                             |
     ~                                                               ~
     |                                                               |
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
     |                          Destination 1                        |
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
     ~                              ...                              ~
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
     |                          Destination N                        |
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
     |             Port 1            |         Port 2                |
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
     ~                              ...                              ~
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
     |             Port N            |         padding               |
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
                                 Figure 5

   BITMAP = every destination has a corresponding bit in the bitmap to
   indicate whether the destination is still valid on this branch of the
   tree.  The first bit corresponds to the first destination in the
   list.  This field is 4-octet aligned (e.g. for 49 destinations there
   will be a 64-bit bitmap).  If Xcast is applied in combination with
   IPsec, the bitmap - since it can change on route - has to be moved to
   a new to be defined IPv4 option.

   List of Destinations. Each address size is four octets.

   List of Port Numbers. List of two octet destination port number(s),
   where each port corresponds in placement to the preceding Destination
   Address.




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9.3. IPv6

   The Xcast6 header encoding is similar to IPv4, except that Xcast
   information is stored in IPv6 extension headers.

         [IPv6 header | Xcast6 | transport header | payload ]

9.3.1. IPv6 header

   The IPv6 header will carry the NextHeader value 'Routing Extension'.
   The source address field contains the address of the Xcast sender.
   The destination address field carries the All_Xcast_Routers address.

9.3.2. Xcast6 header

   The Xcast6 header is also composed of a fixed and two variable parts.
   The fixed and the first variable part is carried in a Routing
   Extension.  The second variable part is carried in a Destination
   Extension.

9.3.2.1. Routing Extension header

   The P-bit of Xcast4 is not present because it is implicit by the
   presence or absence of the Destination Extension (Figure 6).

     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
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
     |  Next Header  |  HdrExtLen    |RouteType=Xcast|       0       |
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
     |VERSION|A|X|D| R | NBR_OF_DEST |          CHECKSUM             |
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
     |                       CHANNEL IDENTIFIER                      |
     ~                                                               ~
     |                                                               |
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
     |              List of Addresses and DSCPs                      |
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
                                 Figure 6

   HdrExtLen = The header length is expressed in 8-octets, thus a
   maximum of 127 destinations can be listed (this is why NBR_OF_DEST is
   7-bit).

   RouteType = Xcast should be assigned by IANA.

   The fourth octet is set to 0.




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   R = Reserved.

   CHANNEL IDENTIFIER = 16 octets Channel Identifier (see section 8.3).

   The other fields are defined in section 9.2.2.

   The 'List of Addresses and DSCPs' is 8-octet aligned.  The size of
   the bitmap is determined by the number of destinations and is a
   multiple of 64 bits.

9.3.2.2. Destination Extension header

   Optionally the Destination Extension (Figure 7) is present to specify
   the list of Port Numbers.  The destination header is only evaluated
   by the destination node.


     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
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
     |  Next Header  |  HdrExtLen    |Opt Type=Ports | Opt Data Len  |
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
     |                     List of Port Numbers                      |
     +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
                                 Figure 7

   Option Type for Ports should be assigned by IANA.  The first three
   bits MUST be 010 to indicate that the packet must be discarded if the
   option is unknown and that the option can not be changed en-route.

   The number of Ports MUST be equal to the number of destinations
   specified in the Routing header.


10. Impact on Upper Layer Protocols

   Some fields in the Xcast header(s) can be modified as the packet
   travels along its delivery path. This has an impact on:

10.1. Checksum calculation in transport layer headers

   In transport layer headers, the target of the checksum calculation
   includes the IP pseudo header, transport header and payload (IPv6
   header extensions are not a target).

   The transformation of an Xcast packet to a normal unicast packet -
   (premature) X2U - replaces the multicast address in the IP header
   destination field by the address of a final destination.  If the



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   Xcast header contains a Port List, the port number in the transport
   layer (which should be zero) also needs to be replaced by the port
   number corresponding to the destination.  This requires a
   recalculation of these checksums.  Note that this does not require a
   complete recalculation of the checksum, only a delta calculation,
   e.g. for IPv4:

     Checksum' = ~ (~Checksum + ~daH + ~daL + daH' + daL' + ~dp + dp')

   In which "'" indicates the new values, "da" the destination address,
   "dp" the destination port and "H" and "L" respectively the higher and
   lower 16 bit.

10.2. IPsec

   This is described in [PARI].


11. Gradual Deployment

11.1. Tunneling

   One way to deploy Xcast in a network that has routers that have no
   knowledge of Xcast is to setup "tunnels" between Xcast peers (MBone
   approach). This enables the creation of a virtual network layered on
   top of an existing network [2003]. The Xcast routers exchange and
   maintain Xcast routing information via any standard unicast routing
   protocol (e.g. RIP, OSPF, ISIS). The Xcast routing table that is
   created is simply a standard unicast routing table that contains the
   destinations that have Xcast connectivity, along with their
   corresponding Xcast next hops. In this way, packets may be forwarded
   hop-by-hop to other Xcast routers, or may be "tunneled" through non-
   Xcast routers in the network.

   For example, suppose that A is trying to get packets distributed to
   B, C & D in Figure 8 below, where "X" routers are Xcast-capable, and
   "R" routers are not. Figure 9 shows the routing tables created via
   the Xcast tunnels:













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                                   R4 ---- B
                                  /
                                 /
       A ----- X1 ---- R2 ---- X3                      R8 ---- C
                                 \                    /
                                  \                  /
                                   R5 ---- R6 ---- X7
                                                    \
                                                     \
                                                       R9 ---- D
                                 Figure 8

   Router X1 establishes a tunnel to Xcast peer X3.  Router X3
   establishes a tunnel to Xcast peers X1 and X7.  Router X7 establishes
   a tunnel to Xcast peer X3.

      X1 routing table:     X3 routing table:     X7 routing table:
       Dest |  NextHop       Dest | NextHop        Dest | NextHop
      ------+----------     ------+---------      ------+---------
        B   |   X3             A  |   X1            A   |  X3
        C   |   X3             C  |   X7            B   |  X3
        D   |   X3             D  |   X7

                                 Figure 9

   The source A will send an Xcast packet to its default Xcast router,
   X1, that includes the list of destinations for the packet. The packet
   on the link between X1 and X3 is depicted in Figure 10:























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          +----------+
          | payload  |
          +----------+
          |   UDP    |
          +----------+
          |  Xcast   |
          |  B,C,D   |
          | prot=UDP |
          +----------+
          | inner IP |
          |  src=A   |
          |dst=All_X_|
          |prot=Xcast|
          +----------+
          | outer IP |
          |  src=X1  |
          |  dst=X3  |
          | prot=IP  |
          +----------+
                                 Figure 10

   When X3 receives this packet, it processes it as follows:

   - Perform a route table lookup in the Xcast routing table to
   determine the Xcast next hop for each of the destinations listed in
   the packet.

   - If no Xcast next hop is found, replicate the packet and send a
   standard unicast to the destination.

   - For those destinations for which an Xcast next hop is found,
   partition the destinations based on their next hops.

   - Replicate the packet so that there's one copy of the packet for
   each of the Xcast next hops found in the previous steps.

   - Modify the list of destinations in each of the copies so that the
   list in the copy for a given next hop includes just the destinations
   that ought to be routed through that next hop.

   - Send the modified copies of the packet on to the next hops.

   - Optimization: If there is only one destination for a particular
   Xcast next hop, send the packet as a standard unicast packet to the
   destination, as there is no multicast gain by formatting it as an
   Xcast packet.

   So, in the example above, X1 will send a single packet on to X3 with



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   a destination list of < B C D >. This packet will be received by R2
   as a unicast packet with destination X3, and R2 will forward it on,
   having no knowledge of Xcast. When X3 receives the packet, it will,
   by the algorithm above, send one copy of the packet to destination <
   B > as an ordinary unicast packet, and 1 copy of the packet to X7
   with a destination list of < C D >. R4, R5, and R6 will behave as
   standard routers with no knowledge of Xcast. When X7 receives the
   packet, it will parse the packet and transmit ordinary unicast
   packets addressed to < C > and < D > respectively.

11.2. Premature X2U

   If a router discovers that its downstream neighbor is not Xcast
   capable, it can perform a Premature X2U, i.e. send a unicast packet
   for each destination in the Xcast header which has this neighbor as a
   next hop.  Thus duplication is done before the Xcast packet reached
   its actual branching point.

   A mechanism (protocol/protocol extension) to discover the Xcast
   capability of a neighbor is ffs.  Among others, one could think of an
   extension to a routing protocol to advertise Xcast capabilities or
   one could send periodic 'Xcast pings' to its neighbors (send an Xcast
   packet that contains its own address as a destination and check
   whether the packet returns).

11.3. Semi-permeable tunneling (IPv6 only)

   This is an optimization of tunneling in the sense that it does not
   require (manual) configuration of tunnels. It is enabled by adding a
   Hop-by-Hop Xcast6 header.  An IPv6 packet can initiate/trigger
   additional processing in the on-route routers by using the IPv6 Hop-
   by-hop option.

   The type of the Xcast6 Hop-by-hop option has a prefix '00' so that
   routers that cannot recognize Xcast6 can treat the Xcast6 datagram as
   a normal IPv6 datagram and forward toward the destination in the IPv6
   header.

   Packets will be delivered to all members if at least all
   participating hosts are upgraded.

   When the source A sends an Xcast packet via semi-permeable tunneling
   to destinations B, C and D it will create the packet of Figure 11.
   One of the final destinations will be put in the destination address
   field of the outer IP header.






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          +----------+
          | payload  |
          +----------+
          |   UDP    |
          +----------+
          |  Xcast   |
          |          |
          +----------+
          | inner IP |
          |  src=A   |
          |dst=All_X_|
          |prot=Xcast|
          +----------+
          |  Xcast   |
          |SP-tunnel |
          |Hop-by-hop|
          +----------+
          | outer IP |
          |  src=A   |
          |  dst=B   |
          | prot=IP  |
          +----------+
                                 Figure 11

   Semi-permeable tunneling is a special tunneling technology that
   permits intermediate Xcast routers on a tunnel to check the
   destinations and branch if destinations have a different next hop.

   Note that with the introduction of an Xcast IPv4 option, this
   technique could also be applied in IPv4 networks.

11.4. Special case: deployment without network support

   A special method of deploying Xcast is possible by upgrading only the
   hosts.  By applying tunneling (see section 11.1 and 11.3) with one of
   the final destinations as tunnel endpoint, the Xcast packet will be
   delivered to all destinations when all the hosts are Xcast aware.
   Both normal and semi-permeable tunneling can be used.

   If host B receives this packet, in the above example, it will notice
   the other destinations in the Xcast header.  B will create a new
   Xcast packet and will send it to one of the remaining destinations.

   In the case of Xcast6 and semi-permeable tunneling, Xcast routers can
   be introduced in the network without the need of configuring tunnels.

   The disadvantages of this method are that:




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   - all hosts in the session need to be upgraded.

   - non-optimal routing.

   - anonymity issue: hosts can know the identity of other parties in
   the session (which is not a big issue in conferencing, but maybe for
   some other application?).

   - host has to perform network functions and needs an upstream link
   which has the same bandwidth as its downstream link.


12. (Socket) API

   In the most simple use of Xcast, the final destinations of an Xcast
   packet receive an ordinary unicast UDP packet. This means that hosts
   can receive an Xcast packet with a standard, unmodified TCP/IP stack.

   Hosts can also transmit Xcast packets with a standard TCP/IP stack
   with a small Xcast library that sends Xcast packets on a raw socket.
   This has been used to implement Xcast based applications on both Unix
   and Windows platforms without any kernel changes.

   Another possibility is to modify the sockets interface slightly.  For
   example, one might add an "xcast_sendto" function that works like
   "sendto" but that uses a list of destination addresses in place of
   the single address that "sendto" uses.

13. Security Considerations

   See [PARI].


References


[1075]  D. Waitzman, C. Partridge, S.E. Deering, Distance Vector Multi-
        cast Routing Protocol, RFC 1075, November 1988.

[1770]  C. Graff, "IPv4 Option for Sender Directed Multi-Destination
        Delivery", RFC1770, March 1995.

[1812]  F. Baker, "Requirements for IP Version 4 Routers", RFC1812, June
        1995.

[2003]  Perkins, C., "IP Encapsulation within IP", RFC 2003, October
        1996.




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[2201]  A. Ballardie, Core Based Trees (CBT) Multicast Routing Architec-
        ture, RFC 2201, Sept. 1997.

[2236]  W. Fenner, Internet Group Management Protocol, Version 2, RFC
        2236, Nov. 1997.

[2401]  S. Kent, R. Atkinson, "Security Architecture for the Internet
        Protocol", RFC2401, November 1998.

[2460]  S. Deering, R. Hinden. Internet Protocol, Version 6 (IPv6),
        RFC2460, December 1998.

[2543]  M. Handley, H. Schulzrinne, E. Schooler, J, Rosenberg, "SIP:
        Session Initiation Protocol", RFC2543, March 1999.

[AGUI]  L. Aguilar, "Datagram Routing for Internet Multicasting",
        Sigcomm84, March 1984.

[BOIV]  R. Boivie, N. Feldman, "Small Group Multicast", draft-boivie-
        sgm-01.txt, July 2000.

[DEER]  S. Deering, "Multicast Routing in a datagram internetwork", PhD
        thesis, December 1991.

[DEE2]  S. Deering, D. Estrin, D. Farinacci, V. Jacobson, C. Liu, and L.
        Wei. The Pim Architecture for Wide-area Multicast Routing, ACM
        Transactions on Networks, April 1996

[DOOR]  B. Van Doorslaer, D. Ooms, "SIP for the establishment of xcast-
        based multiparty conferences", draft-van-doorselaer-sip-xcast-
        00.txt, July 2000.

[FARI]  D. Farinacci, "Multicast Source Discovery Protocol", draft-
        farinacci-msdp-00.txt, June 1998.

[H323]  ITU-T Recommendation H.323 (2000), Packet-Based Multimedia Com-
        munications Systems.

[HOLB]  H. Holbrook, B. Cain, "Source-Specific Multicast for IP",
        draft-holbrook-ssm-00.txt, March 2000.

[IMAI]  Y. Imai, Multiple Destination option on IPv6 (MDO6), <draft-
        imai-mdo6-02.txt>, September 2000

[MBONE] Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) on the Multicast Backbone
        (MBONE), ftp://venera.isi.edu/mbone/faq.txt

[OOMS]  D. Ooms, W. Livens, Connectionless Multicast, <draft-ooms-cl-



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        multicast-02.txt>, April 2000

[PARI]  O. Paridaens, D. Ooms, Security Framework for Explicit Multi-
        cast, draft-paridaens-xcast-sec-framework-01.txt, November 2000.

[PERL]  R. Perlman, "Simple Multicast: A design for Simple, Low-overhead
        Multicast", draft-perlman-simple-multicast-02.txt, February
        1999.

[RMT]   Reliable Multicast Transport Working Group web site,
        http://www.ietf.org/html.charters/rmt-charter.html, June 15,
        1999

[SOLA]  M. Sola, M. Ohta, T. Maeno. Scalability of Internet Multicast
        Protocols, INET'98,
        http://www.isoc.org/inet98/proceedings/6d/6d_3.htm


Authors Addresses

   Rick Boivie
   IBM T. J. Watson Research Center
   30 Saw Mill River Rd.
   Hawthorne, NY 10532
   Phone: 914-784-3251
   Email: rhboivie@us.ibm.com

   Nancy Feldman
   IBM T. J. Watson Research Center
   30 Saw Mill River Rd.
   Hawthorne, NY 10532
   Phone: 914-784-3254
   Email: nkf@us.ibm.com

   Yuji Imai
   Fujitsu LABORATORIES Ltd.
   1-1, Kamikodanaka 4-Chome, Nakahara-ku, Kawasaki 211-8588, Japan
   Phone : +81-44-754-2628
   Fax   : +81-44-754-2793
   E-mail: kimai@flab.fujitsu.co.jp

   Wim Livens
   Colt Telecom
   Zweefvliegtuigstraat 10, 1130 Brussel, Belgium.
   Phone : 32 2 7901705
   Fax   : 32 2 7901711
   E-mail: WLivens@colt-telecom.be




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   Dirk Ooms
   Alcatel Network Strategy Group
   Fr. Wellesplein 1, 2018 Antwerpen, Belgium.
   Phone : 32 3 2404732
   E-mail: Dirk.Ooms@alcatel.be

   Olivier Paridaens
   Alcatel Network Strategy Group
   Fr. Wellesplein 1, 2018 Antwerpen, Belgium.
   Phone : 32 3 2409320
   E-mail: Olivier.Paridaens@alcatel.be








































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