Network Working Group L. Wood
Internet-Draft University of Surrey
Intended status: Experimental J. McKim
Expires: November 9, 2010 RSIS
W. Eddy
MTI Systems
W. Ivancic
NASA
C. Jackson
SSTL
May 8, 2010
Saratoga: A Scalable File Transfer Protocol
draft-wood-tsvwg-saratoga-05
Abstract
This document specifies the Saratoga transfer protocol. Saratoga was
originally developed to efficiently transfer remote-sensing imagery
from a low-Earth-orbiting satellite constellation, but is useful for
many other scenarios, including ad-hoc peer-to-peer communications,
delay-tolerant networking, and grid computing. Saratoga is a simple,
lightweight, content dissemination protocol that builds on UDP, and
optionally uses UDP-Lite. Saratoga is intended for use when moving
files or streaming data between peers which may have only sporadic or
intermittent connectivity, and is capable of transferring very large
amounts of data reliably under adverse conditions. The Saratoga
protocol is designed to cope with highly asymmetric link or path
capacity between peers, and can support fully-unidirectional data
transfer if required. In scenarios with dedicated links, Saratoga
focuses on high link utilization to make the most of limited
connectivity times, while standard congestion control mechanisms can
be implemented for operation over shared links. Loss recovery is
implemented via a simple negative-ack ARQ mechanism. The protocol
specified in this document is considered to be appropriate for
experimental use on private IP networks.
Status of this Memo
This Internet-Draft is submitted to IETF in full conformance with the
provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79. This document may not be modified,
and derivative works of it may not be created, except to format it
for publication as an RFC and to translate it into languages other
than English.
Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering
Task Force (IETF). Note that other groups may also distribute
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working documents as Internet-Drafts. The list of current Internet-
Drafts is at http://datatracker.ietf.org/drafts/current/.
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."
This Internet-Draft will expire on November 9, 2010.
Copyright Notice
Copyright (c) 2010 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
document authors. All rights reserved.
This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
Provisions Relating to IETF Documents
(http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of
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to this document. Code Components extracted from this document must
include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of
the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as
described in the Simplified BSD License.
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Table of Contents
1. Background and Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
2. Overview of Saratoga File Transfer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
3. Optional Parts of Saratoga . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
4. Packet Types . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
4.1. BEACON . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
4.2. REQUEST . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
4.3. METADATA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
4.4. DATA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
4.5. HOLESTOFILL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
5. The Directory Entry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
6. Behavior of a Saratoga Peer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
6.1. Saratoga Transactions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
6.2. Beacons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
6.3. Upper-Layer Interface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
6.4. Inactivity Timer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
7. Mailing list . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
8. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
9. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
10. Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
11. A Note on Naming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
12. References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
12.1. Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
12.2. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
Appendix A. Appendix: Timestamp/Nonce field considerations . . . 43
Authors' Addresses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
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1. Background and Introduction
Saratoga is a file transfer and content dissemination protocol
capable of efficiently sending both small and very large files as
well as streaming continuous content. Saratoga was originally
designed for the purpose of large file transfer from small low-Earth-
orbit satellites. It has been used in daily operations since 2004 to
move mission imaging data files on the order of several hundred
megabytes each from the Disaster Monitoring Constellation (DMC)
remote-sensing satellites to ground stations.
The DMC satellites, built at the University of Surrey by Surrey
Satellite Technology Ltd (SSTL), all use IP for payload
communications and delivery of Earth imagery. At the time of this
writing in October 2009, seven DMC satellites have been launched into
orbit; six are currently operational; and further DMC satellites are
under construction. The DMC satellites use Saratoga to provide
imagery under the aegis of the International Charter on Space and
Major Disasters. A pass of connectivity between a satellite and
ground station offers an 8-12 minute time window in which to transfer
imagery files using a minimum of an 8.1 Mbps downlink and a 9.6 kbps
uplink. The newer DMC satellites have faster downlinks, with some
capable of 80 Mbps. Others are planned to provide upwards of 200
Mbps, without significant increases in uplink rates. This high
degree of asymmetry, and need to fully utilize the downlink to move
the volume of data required within the limited time available,
motivates much of Saratoga's design.
Further details on how these DMC satellites use IP to communicate
with the ground and the terrestrial Internet are discussed in other
documents [Hogie05][Wood07a][Wood07b].
Store-and-forward delivery relies on reliable hop-by-hop transfers of
files, removing the need for the final receiver to talk to the
original sender across long delays and allowing for the possibility
that an end-to-end path may never exist between sender and receiver
at any given time. Use of store-and-forward hop-by-hop delivery is
typical of scenarios in space exploration for both near-Earth and
deep-space missions, and useful for other scenarios, such as
underwater networking, ad-hoc sensor networks, and some message-
ferrying relay scenarios. Saratoga is intended to be useful for
relaying data in these scenarios and can optionally also be used to
carry the Bundle Protocol "bundles" that is proposed for use in Delay
and Disruption-Tolerant Networking (DTN) by the IRTF DTN Research
Group [RFC5050]. How Saratoga can optionally function as a "bundle
convergence layer" alongside a DTN bundle agent is specified in a
companion document [I-D.wood-dtnrg-saratoga].
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High link utilization is important during periods of limited
connectivity. Given that Saratoga was originally developed for
scheduled peer-to-peer communications over dedicated links in private
networks where each application has the entire link for the duration
of its transfer, early Saratoga implementations deliberately lack any
form of congestion control and send at line rate. Newer
implementations may perform TCP-Friendly Rate Control (TFRC)
[RFC3448] or other congestion control mechanisms such as LEDBAT
[I-D.ietf-ledbat-congestion], if appropriate for the environment and
where simultaneous sharing of capacity with other traffic and
applications is required.
Saratoga contains a Selective Negative Acknowledgement (SNACK)
mechanism to provide reliable retransmission of data. This was
intended to correct losses of corrupted link-layer frames due to
channel noise over a space link. Packet losses in the DMC are due to
corruption introducing non-recoverable errors in the frame. The DMC
design uses point-to-point links and scheduling of applications so
that the link is dedicated to one application transfer at a time,
meaning that packet loss can not be due to congestion as applications
compete for link capacity. In other wireless environments that may
be shared by many nodes and applications, allocation of channel
resources to nodes becomes a MAC-layer function. Forward Error
Coding (FEC) to get the most reliable transmission through a channel
is best left near the physical layer so that it can be tailored for
the channel. Use of FEC complements Saratoga's transport-level
negative-acknowledgement approach to provide a reliable ARQ mechanism
[RFC3366].
Saratoga is scalable in that it is capable of efficiently
transferring small or large files, by choosing a width of file offset
descriptor appropriate for the filesize, and advertising accepted
offset descriptor sizes. 16-bit, 32-bit, 64-bit and 128-bit
descriptors can be selected, for maximum file sizes of 64KiB-1,
4GiB-1, 2^64-1 and 2^128-1 octets. Earth imaging files currently
transferred by Saratoga are mostly up to a few gigabytes in size.
Some implementations do transfer more than 4 GiB in size, and so
require offset descriptors larger than 32 bits. We expect that a
128-bit descriptor will satisfy all future needs, but we expect
current implementations to only support up to 32-bit or 64-bit
descriptors, depending on their application needs. The 16-bit
descriptor is useful for small messages, including messages from
8-bit devices, and is always supported. The 128-bit descriptor is
useful for moving very large files stored on a 128-bit filesystem,
such as on OpenSolaris ZFS.
Saratoga can be used with either IPv4 or IPv6. Compatibility between
Saratoga and the wide variety of links that can already carry IP
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traffic is assured.
Saratoga was originally implemented as outlined in [Jackson04], but
the specification given here differs substantially, as we have added
a number of features, while cleaning up the initial Saratoga
specification. The original Saratoga code uses a version number of
0, while code that implements this version of the protocol advertises
a version number of 1. Further discussion of the history and
development of Saratoga is given in [Wood07b].
This document contains an overview of the transfer process and
transactions using Saratoga in Section 2, followed by a formal
definition of the packet types used by Saratoga in Section 4, and the
details of the various protocol mechanisms in Section 6.
Here, Saratoga transaction types are labelled with underscores around
lowercase names (such as a "_get_" transaction), while Saratoga
packet types are labelled in all capitals (such as a "REQUEST"
packet) in order to distinguish between the two.
The remainder of this specification uses 'file' as a shorthand for
'binary object', which may be a DTN bundle, or other type of data.
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]
2. Overview of Saratoga File Transfer
Saratoga is a peer-to-peer protocol in the sense that multiple files
may be transferred in both directions simultaneously between two
communicating Saratoga peers, and there is not intended to be a
strict client-to-server relationship.
Saratoga nodes are simple file servers. Saratoga supports several
types of operations on files including "pull" downloads, "push"
uploads, directory listing, and deletion requests. Each operation is
handled as a distinct "transaction" between the peers.
Saratoga nodes MAY advertise their presence, capabilities, and
desires by sending BEACON packets. These BEACONs are sent to either
a reserved, unforwardable, multicast address when using IPv4, or a
link-local all-Saratoga-peers multicast address when using IPv6. A
BEACON might also be unicast to another known node as a sort of
"keepalive". Saratoga nodes may dynamically discover other Saratoga
nodes either through listening for BEACONs, through pre-
configuration, or via some other trigger from a user, lower-layer
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protocol, or another process. The BEACON is simply useful in low-
delay ad-hoc networking or as explicit confirmation that another node
is present; it is not required in order to begin a Saratoga
transaction. BEACONs have been used by the DMC satellites to
indicate to ground stations that a link has become functional, a
solid-state data recorder is online, and the software is ready to
transfer any requested files.
A Saratoga transaction begins with either a _get_, _put_, _getdir_,
or _delete_ transaction REQUEST packet corresponding to a desired
download, upload, directory listing, or deletion operation. The most
common envisioned transaction is the _get_, which begins with a
single Saratoga REQUEST packet sent from the peer wishing to receive
the file, to the peer who currently has the file. If the transaction
is rejected, then a brief METADATA packet that conveys rejection is
generated. If the file-serving peer accepts the transaction, it
generates and sends a more useful descriptive METADATA packet,
followed by some number of DATA packets constituting the requested
file.
These DATA packets are finished by (and can intermittently include) a
DATA packet with a flag bit set that demands the file-receiver send a
reception report in the form of a HOLESTOFILL packet. The
HOLESTOFILL packet is a Selective Negative Acknowledgement listing
spans of octets within the file that have not yet been received as
well as whether or not the METADATA packet was received. From this
HOLESTOFILL packet, the file-sender begins a cycle of selective
retransmissions of DATA packets, until it sees a HOLESTOFILL packet
that acknowledges total reception of all file data.
In the example scenario in Figure 1, a _get_ request is granted. The
reliable file delivery experiences loss of a single DATA packet due
to channel-induced errors.
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File-Receiver File-Sender
REQUEST --------------------->
(transfer accepted) <--------- METADATA
HOLESTOFILL -----------------> (voluntarily sent at start)
<------------------------- DATA #1
(lost) <------ DATA #2
<------------------------- DATA #3 (bit set
requesting HOLESTOFILL)
HOLESTOFILL ----------------->
(indicating that range in DATA #2 was lost)
<------------------------- DATA #2 (bit set
requesting HOLESTOFILL)
HOLESTOFILL ----------------->
(complete file and METADATA received)
Figure 1: Example _get_ transaction sequence
A _getdir_ request proceeds similarly, though the DATA packets
contain the contents of a directory listing, described later, rather
than a given file's bytes. _getdir_ is the only request to apply to
directories.
The HOLESTOFILL and DATA packets are allowed to be sent at any time
within the scope of a transaction in order for the file-sending node
to optimize buffer management and transmission order. For example,
if the file-receiver already has the first half of a file from a
previous disrupted transfer, it may send a HOLESTOFILL at the
beginning of the transaction indicating that it has the first half of
the file, and so only needs the last half of the file. Thus,
efficient recovery from interrupted sessions between peers becomes
possible, similar to ranged FTP and HTTP requests.
In deep-space scenarios, the large propagation delays and round-trip
times involved prohibit ping-pong packet exchanges for starting
transactions. The Saratoga _put_ transaction is useful in such
cases. A _put_ is initiated by the file-sender sending a METADATA
packet followed by immediate DATA packets. This is highly desirable
in long-propagation deep-space (and similar) scenarios, without first
waiting for a HOLESTOFILL. This can be considered an "optimistic"
mode of protocol operation, as it assumes the transaction request
will be granted. If the sender of a PUT request sees a METADATA
packet indicating that the request was declined, it MUST stop sending
any DATA packets within that transaction immediately. Since this
type of _put_ is open-loop for some period of time, it should not be
used in scenarios where congestion is a valid concern; in these
cases, the file-sender should wait on its METADATA to be acknowledged
by a HOLESTOFILL before sending DATA packets within the transaction.
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Figure 2 illustrates the sequence of packets in an example _put_
transaction where the second DATA packet is lost. Other than the way
that it is initiated, a _put_ transaction is identical to a _get_
transaction.
File-Sender File-Receiver
METADATA ---------------->
(transfer accepted) <---------- HOLESTOFILL
DATA #1 ---------------->
DATA #2 ---> (lost)
DATA #3 (bit set ------------>
requesting HOLESTOFILL)
(DATA #2 lost) <------------- HOLESTOFILL
DATA #2 (bit set ----------->
requesting HOLESTOFILL)
(transfer complete) <---------- HOLESTOFILL
Figure 2: Example PUT transaction sequence
The _delete_ transactions are simple single packet requests that
trigger a HOLESTOFILL packet with a status code that indicates
whether the file was deleted or not. If the file is not able to be
deleted for some reason, this reason can be conveyed in the Status
field of the HOLESTOFILL packet.
A _get_ REQUEST packet that does not specify a filename (i.e. the
request contains a zero-length File Path field) is specially defined
to be a request for any chosen file that the peer wishes to send it.
This allows a Saratoga peer to blindly request any files that the
other Saratoga peer has ready for it, without prior knowledge of the
directory listing, and without requiring the ability to examine files
or decode remote file names/paths for meaningful information such as
final destination.
If a file is larger than Saratoga can be expected to transfer during
a time-limited contact, there are at least two feasible options:
(1) The application can use proactive fragmentation to create
multiple smaller-sized files. Saratoga can transfer some number of
these smaller files fully during a contact.
(2) To avoid file fragmentation, a Saratoga file-receiver can retain
a partially-transferred file and request transfer of the unreceived
bytes during a later contact. This uses a HOLESTOFILL packet to make
clear how much of the file has been successfully received and where
transfer should be resumed from. On resumption, the new METADATA
(including file length, file timestamps, and possibly MD5 sum) MUST
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match that of the previous METADATA in order to re-establish the
transfer. Otherwise, the file-receiver MUST assume that the file has
changed and purge the DATA received during the first contact.
If a file contains separate parts that require reliable transmission
without errors or that can tolerate errors in delivered content,
proactive fragmentation can be used to split the file into separate
reliable and unreliable files that can be transferred separately,
using UDP or UDP-Lite.
If parts of a file require reliability but the rest can be sent by
unreliable transfer, the file-sender can use its knowledge of the
internal file structure and vary DATA packet size so that the
reliable parts always start after the offset field and are covered by
the UDP-Lite checksum.
A file that permits unreliable delivery may be transferred onwards
using UDP, although the METADATA flag indicating that unreliable
transmission is permitted is retained for later hops, which may
revert to using UDP-Lite. If the current sender does not understand
the internal file format to be able to decide what parts must be
protected, the current sender or receiver does not support UDP-Lite,
or the current protocol stack only implements error-free frame
delivery below the UDP layer, then the file may be delivered using
UDP.
Like the BEACON packets, a _put_ or a response to a _get_ may be sent
to the dedicated IPv4 Saratoga multicast address (allocated to
224.0.0.108) or the dedicated IPv6 link-local multicast address
(allocated to FF02:0:0:0:0:0:0:6C) for multiple file-receivers on the
link to hear. This is at the discretion of the file-sender, if it
believes that there is interest from multiple receivers. In-progress
DATA transfers may also be moved seamlessly from unicast to multicast
if the file-sender learns during a transfer, from receipt of further
unicast _get_ REQUEST packets, that multiple nodes are interested in
the file. The associated METADATA packet is multicast when this
transition takes place, and is then repeated periodically while the
DATA stream is being sent, to inform newly-arrived listeners about
the file being multicast. Acknowledgements MUST NOT be demanded by
multicast DATA packets, to prevent ack implosion at the file-sender,
and instead holestofill information is aggregated and sent
voluntarily by all file-receivers. File-receivers respond to
multicast DATA with multicast HOLESTOFILL packets. File-receivers
should introduce a short random delay before sending a HOLESTOFILL
packet, to prevent ack implosion after a channel-induced loss, and
must listen for HOLESTOFILL packets from others, to avoid duplicating
fill requests. The file-sender SHOULD repeat any initial unicast
portion of the transfer as multicast last of all, and may repeat and
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cycle through multicast of the file several times while file-
receivers express interest via HOLESTOFILL or _get_ packets. Once in
multicast and with METADATA being repeated periodically, new file-
receivers do not need to send individual REQUEST packets. If a
transfer has been started using UDP-Lite and new receivers indicate
UDP-only capability, multicast transfers MUST switch to using UDP to
accommodate them.
3. Optional Parts of Saratoga
Implementing support for some parts of Saratoga is optional. These
parts are:
- sending and parsing BEACONs
- support for working with DTN bundles and a bundle agent as an
application driving Saratoga. Use of a filesystem is expected.
- transfers permitting some errors in content delivered, using UDP-
Lite. These can be useful for decreasing delivery time over
unreliable channels, especially for unidirectional links - but
requires that lower-layer frames permit delivery of unreliable data.
- streaming data, including real-time streaming of content of unknown
length. This streaming can be unreliable (without resend requests)
or reliable (with resend requests). Session protocols such as http
expect reliable streaming, and can be used in delay-tolerant networks
[I-D.wood-dtnrg-http-dtn-delivery]. Although Saratoga data delivery
is inherently one-way, where a stream of DATA packets elicits a
stream of HOLESTOFILL packets, bidirectional duplex communication can
be established by using two Saratoga transfers flowing in opposite
directions.
- sending and responding to packet timestamps in DATA and HOLESTOFILL
packets. These timestamps are useful for streaming and for giving a
file-sender an indication of path latency for rate control. There is
no need for a file-receiver to understand the format used for these
timestamps for it to be able to receive and reflect them.
- performing congestion control at the sender, based on feedback from
acknowledgement HOLESTOFILL packets, or simple open-loop rate control
- multicast DATA transfers, if judged useful for the environment in
which Saratoga is deployed.
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4. Packet Types
Saratoga is defined for use with UDP over either IPv4 or IPv6
[RFC0768]. UDP checksums, which are mandatory with IPv6, MUST be
used with IPv4. Within either version of IP datagram, a Saratoga
packet appears as a typical UDP header followed by an octet
indicating how the remainder of the packet is to be interpreted:
1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 3 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
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| UDP source port | UDP destination port |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| UDP length | UDP checksum |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
|Ver|Packet Type| other Saratoga fields ... //
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+//
Saratoga data transfers can also be carried out using UDP-Lite
[RFC3828]. If Saratoga can be carried over UDP-Lite, the
implementation MUST also support UDP. All packet types except DATA
MUST be sent using UDP with checksums turned on. For reliable
transfers, DATA packets are sent using UDP with checksums turned on.
For files where unreliable transfer has been indicated as desired and
possible, the sender MAY send DATA packets unreliably over UDP-Lite,
where UDP-Lite protects only the Saratoga headers and parts of the
file that must be transmitted reliably.
The two-bit Saratoga version field ("Ver") identifies the version of
the Saratoga protocol that the packet conforms to. The value 01
should be used in this field for implementations conforming to the
specification in this document, which specifies version 1 of
Saratoga. The value 00 was used in earlier implementations, prior to
the formal specification and public submission of the protocol
design, and is incompatible with version 01 in several respects.
The six-bit Saratoga "Packet Type" field indicates how the remainder
of the packet is intended to be decoded and processed:
+---+-------------+-------------------------------------------+
| # | Type | Use |
+---+-------------+-------------------------------------------+
| 0 | BEACON | Beacon packet indicating peer status |
| 1 | REQUEST | Commands peer to start a transfer |
| 2 | METADATA | Carries file transfer metadata |
| 3 | DATA | Carries octets of file data |
| 4 | HOLESTOFILL | Signals list of unreceived data to sender |
+---+-------------+-------------------------------------------+
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Several of these packet types include a Flags field, for which only
some of the bits have defined meanings and usages in this document.
Other, undefined, bits may be reserved for future use. Following the
principle of being conservative in what you send and liberal in what
you accept, a packet sender MUST set any undefined bits to zero, and
a packet recipient MUST NOT rely on these undefined bits being zero
on reception.
The specific formats for the different types of packets are given in
this section. Some packet types contain file offset descriptor
fields, which contain unsigned integers. The lengths of the offset
descriptors are fixed within a transfer, but vary between file
transfers. The size is set for each particular transfer, depending
on the choice of offset descriptor width made in the METADATA packet,
which in turn depends on the size of file being transferred.
In this document, all of the packet structure figures illustrating a
packet format assume 32-bit lengths for these offset descriptor
fields, and indicate the transfer-dependent length of the fields by
using a "(descriptor)" designation within the [field] in all packet
diagrams. That is:
The example 32-bit descriptors shown in all diagrams here
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
[ (descriptor) ]
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
are suitable for files of up to 4GiB - 1 octets in length, and may be
replaced in a file transfer by descriptors using a different length,
depending on the size of file to be transferred:
128-bit descriptor for very long files (optional)
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
[ (descriptor) /
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
/ (descriptor, continued) /
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
/ (descriptor, continued) /
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
/ (descriptor, continued) ]
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
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64-bit descriptor for longer files (optional)
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
[ (descriptor) /
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
/ (descriptor, continued) ]
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
16-bit descriptor for short files (MUST be supported)
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
[ (descriptor) ]
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
For offset descriptors and types of content being transferred, the
related flag bits in BEACON and REQUEST indicate capabilities, while
in METADATA and DATA those flag bits are used slightly differently,
to indicate the content being transferred.
Saratoga packets are intended to fit within link MTUs to avoid the
inefficiencies and overheads of lower-layer fragmentation. A
Saratoga implementation itself does not perform any form of MTU
discovery, but is assumed to be configured with knowledge of usable
maximum IP MTUs for the link interfaces it uses.
4.1. BEACON
BEACON packets may be multicast periodically by nodes willing to act
as Saratoga peers. Some implementations have done so every 100
milliseconds, but this rate is arbitrary, and should be chosen to be
appropriate for the environment and implementation.
The main purpose for sending BEACONs is to announce the presence of
the node to potential peers (e.g. satellites, ground stations) to
provide automatic service discovery, and also to confirm the activity
or presence of the peer.
The Endpoint Identifier (EID) in the BEACON serves to uniquely
identify the Saratoga peer. Whenever the Saratoga peer begins using
a new IP address, it SHOULD issue a BEACON on it and repeat the
BEACON periodically, to enable listeners to associate the IP address
with the EID and the peer.
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Format
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 2
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
|0 1| Type | Flags |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| Endpoint identifier... //
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+//
where
+------------+------------------------------------------------------+
| Field | Description |
+------------+------------------------------------------------------+
| Type | 0 |
| Flags | convey whether or not the peer is ready to |
| | send/receive and what the maximum supported file |
| | size range and descriptor is. |
| Endpoint | This can be used to uniquely identify the sending |
| identifier | Saratoga peer, or the administrative node that the |
| | BEACON-sender is associated with. If Saratoga is |
| | being used with a bundle agent, a bundle endpoint ID |
| | (EID) can be used here. |
+------------+------------------------------------------------------+
The Flags field is used to provide some additional information about
the peer. The first octet of the Flags field is currently in use.
The later two octets are for future use, and MUST be set to zero.
The two highest-order bits (bits 8 and 9 above) indicate the maximum
supported file size parameters that the peer's Saratoga
implementation permits. Other Saratoga packet types contain
variable-length fields that convey file sizes or offsets into a file
-- the file offset descriptors. These descriptors may be 16-bit, 32-
bit, 64-bit, or 128-bit in length, depending on the size of the file
being transferred and/or the integer types supported by the sending
peer. The indicated bounds for the possible values of these bits are
summarized below:
+-------+-------+-------------------------+-------------------+
| Bit 8 | Bit 9 | Supported Field Sizes | Maximum File Size |
+-------+-------+-------------------------+-------------------+
| 0 | 0 | 16 bits | 2^16 - 1 octets. |
| 0 | 1 | 16 or 32 bits | 2^32 - 1 octets. |
| 1 | 0 | 16, 32, or 64 bits | 2^64 - 1 octets. |
| 1 | 1 | 16, 32, 64, or 128 bits | 2^128 - 1 octets. |
+-------+-------+-------------------------+-------------------+
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If a Saratoga peer advertises it is capable of receiving a certain
size of file, then it MUST also be capable of receiving files sent
using smaller descriptor values. This avoids overhead on small
files, while increasing interoperability between peers.
It is likely when sending unbounded streams that a larger offset
descriptor field size will be preferred to minimise problems with
offset sequences wrapping. Protecting against sequence wrapping is
discussed in the HOLESTOFILL section.
+-----+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| Bit | Value | Meaning |
+-----+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| 10 | 0 | not able to pass bundles to a local bundle agent; |
| | | handles files. |
| 10 | 1 | can pass marked bundles to a local bundle agent. |
+-----+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
Bit 10 is reserved for DTN bundle agent use, indicating whether the
sender is capable of handling bundles via a local bundle agent. This
is described in [I-D.wood-dtnrg-saratoga].
Any type of host identifier can be used in the endpoint identifier
field, as long as it is a reasonably unique string within the range
of operational deployment. This field encompasses the remainder of
the packet, and might contain non-UTF-8 and/or null characters.
+-----+-------+--------------------------------------+
| Bit | Value | Meaning |
+-----+-------+--------------------------------------+
| 11 | 0 | not capable of supporting streaming. |
| 11 | 1 | capable of supporting streaming. |
+-----+-------+--------------------------------------+
Bit 11 is used to indicate whether the sender is capable of sending
and receiving continuous streams.
+--------+--------+------------------------------------------------+
| Bit 12 | Bit 13 | Capability and willingness to send files |
+--------+--------+------------------------------------------------+
| 0 | 0 | cannot send files at all. |
| 0 | 1 | invalid. |
| 1 | 0 | capable of sending, but not willing right now. |
| 1 | 1 | capable of and willing to send files. |
+--------+--------+------------------------------------------------+
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+--------+--------+-------------------------------------------------+
| Bit 14 | Bit 15 | Capability and willingness to receive files |
+--------+--------+-------------------------------------------------+
| 0 | 0 | cannot receive files at all. |
| 0 | 1 | invalid. |
| 1 | 0 | capable of receiving, but will reject METADATA. |
| 1 | 1 | capable of and willing to receive files. |
+--------+--------+-------------------------------------------------+
Also in the Flags field, bits 12 and 14 act as capability bits, while
bits 13 and 15 augment those flags with bits indicating current
willingness to use the capability.
Bits 12 and 13 deal with sending, while bits 14 and 15 deal with
receiving. If bit 12 is set, then the peer has the capability to
send files. If bit 14 is set, then the peer has the capability to
receive files. Bits 13 and 15 indicate willingness to send and
receive files, respectively.
A peer that is able to act as a file-sender MUST set the capability
bit 12 in all BEACONs that it sends, regardless of whether it is
willing to send any particular files to a particular peer at a
particular time. Bit 13 indicates the current presence of data to
send and a willingness to send it in general, in order to augment the
capability advertised by bit 12.
If bit 14 is set, then the peer is capable of acting as a receiver,
although it still might not currently be ready or willing to receive
files (for instance, it may be low on free storage). This bit MUST
be set in any BEACON packets sent by nodes capable of acting as file-
receivers. Bit 15 augments this by expresses a current general
willingness to receive and accept files.
+-----+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| Bit | Value | Meaning |
+-----+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| 16 | 0 | supports DATA transfers over UDP only. |
| 16 | 1 | supports DATA transfers over both UDP and UDP-Lite. |
+-----+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
Bit 16 is used to indicate whether the sender is capable of sending
and receiving unreliable transfers via UDP-Lite.
4.2. REQUEST
A REQUEST packet is a command to perform either a _get_, _getdir_, or
_delete_ transaction.
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Format
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
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
|0 1| Type | Flags |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| Id |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| variable-length File Path ... /
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
/ /
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
/ | null byte | /
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
/ variable-length Authentication Field (optional) |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
where
+--------+----------------------------------------------------------+
| Field | Description |
+--------+----------------------------------------------------------+
| Type | 1 |
| Flags | provide additional information about the requested |
| | file/operation; see table below for definition. |
| Id | uniquely identifies the transaction between two peers. |
| File | the path of the requested file/directory following the |
| Path | rules described below. |
+--------+----------------------------------------------------------+
The Id that is used during transactions serves to uniquely associate
a given packet with a particular transaction. This enables multiple
simultaneous data transfer transactions between two peers, with each
peer deciding how to multiplex and prioritise the parallel flows it
sends. The Id for a transaction is selected by the initiator so as
to not conflict with any other in-progress or recent transactions
with the same host. This Id should be unique and generated using
properties of the file, which will remain constant across a host
reboot. The 3-tuple of both host identifiers and a carefully-
generated transaction Id field can be used to uniquely index a
particular transaction's state.
In the Flags field, the bits labelled 8 and 9 in the figure above
indicate the maximum supported file length fields that the peer can
handle, and are interpreted exactly as the bits 8 and 9 in the BEACON
packet described above. The remaining defined bits are:
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+-----+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| Bit | Value | Meaning |
+-----+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| 10 | 0 | The requester cannot handle bundles locally. |
| 10 | 1 | The requester can handle bundles. |
| 11 | 0 | The requester cannot receive streams. |
| 11 | 1 | The requester is also able to receive streams. |
| 14 | 0 | a _get_ or _getdir_ transaction is requested |
| 14 | 1 | a _delete_ transaction is requested |
| 15 | 0 | the File Path field holds a file for a _get_ or |
| | | _delete_ |
| 15 | 1 | the File Path field specifies a directory name for |
| | | a _getdir_ or _delete_ |
| 16 | 0 | The requester is able to receive DATA over UDP |
| | | only. |
| 16 | 1 | The requester is also able to receive DATA over |
| | | UDP-Lite. |
+-----+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
The File Path portion of a _get_ packet is a null-terminated UTF-8
encoded string [RFC3629] that represents the path and base file name
on the file-sender of the file (or directory) that the file-receiver
wishes to perform the _get_, _getdir_, or _delete_ operation on.
Implementations SHOULD only send as many octets of File Path as are
needed for carrying this string, although some implementations MAY
choose to send a fixed-size File Path field in all REQUEST packets
that is filled with null octets after the last UTF-8 encoded octet of
the path. A maximum of 1024 octets for this field, and for the File
Path fields in other Saratoga packet types, is used to limit the
total packet size to within a single IPv6 minimum MTU (minus some
padding for network layer headers), and thus avoid the need for
fragmentation. The 1024-octet maximum applies after UTF-8 encoding
and null termination.
As in the standard Internet File Transfer Protocol (FTP) [RFC0959],
for path separators, Saratoga allows the local naming convention on
the peers to be used. There are security implications to processing
these strings without some intelligent filtering and checking on the
filesystem items they refer to, as discussed in the Security
Considerations section later within this document.
If the File Path field is empty, i.e. is a null-terminated zero-
length string one octet long, then this indicates that the file-
receiver is ready to receive any file that the file-sender would like
to send it, rather than requesting a particular file. This allows
the file-sender to determine the order and selection of files that it
would like to forward to the receiver in more of a "push" manner. Of
course, file retrieval could also follow a "pull" manner, with the
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file-receiving host requesting specific files from the file-sender.
This may be desirable at times if the file-receiver is low on storage
space, or other resources. The file-receiver could also use the
Saratoga _getdir_ transaction results in order to select small files,
or make other optimizations, such as using its local knowledge of
contact times to pick files of a size likely to be able to be
delivered completely. File transfer through pushing sender-selected
files implements delivery prioritization decisions made solely at the
Saratoga file-sending node. File transfer through pulling specific
receiver-selected files implements prioritization involving more
participation from the Saratoga file-receiver. This is how Saratoga
implements Quality of Service (QoS).
The null-terminated File Path string MAY be followed by an optional
Authentication Field that can be used to validate the REQUEST packet.
Any value in the Authentication Field is the result of a computation
of packet contents that SHOULD include, at a minimum, source and
destination IP addresses and port numbers and packet length in a
'pseudo-header', as well as the content of all Saratoga fields from
Version to File Path, excluding the predictable null-termination
octet. This Authentication Field can be used to allow the REQUEST
receiver to discriminate between other peers, and permit and deny
various REQUEST actions as appropriate. The format of this field is
unspecified for local use.
REQUEST packets may be sent multicast, to learn about all listening
nodes. A multicast _get_ request for a file that elicits multiple
METADATA responses should be followed by unicast HOLESTOFILL packets
with status errors cancelling all but one of the proposed transfers.
File timestamps in the Directory Entry can be used to select the most
recent version of an offered file, and the host to fetch it from.
If the receiver already has the file at the expected file path and is
requesting an update to that file, REQUEST can be sent after a
METADATA advertising that file, to allow the sender to determine
whether a replacement for the file should be sent.
Delete requests are ignored for files currently being transferred.
4.3. METADATA
METADATA packets are sent as part of a data transfer transaction
(_get_, _getfile_, and _put_). A METADATA packet says how large the
file is and what its name is, as well as what size of file offset
descriptor is chosen for the session. METADATA packets are normally
sent at the start of a data transfer, but may be repeated if
requested.
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Format
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
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
|0 1| Type | Flags |Sumtype|
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| Id |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| /
/ /
/ example error-detection checksum (128-bit MD5 shown) /
/ /
/ |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| /
/ single Directory Entry describing file /
/ (variable length) /
/ //
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-//
where
+-----------+-------------------------------------------------------+
| Field | Description |
+-----------+-------------------------------------------------------+
| Type | 2 |
| Flags | indicate additional boolean metadata about a file |
| Sumtype | indicates whether a checksum is present after the Id, |
| | and what type it is. |
| Id | identifies the transaction that this packet describes |
| Checksum | an example included checksum covering file contents |
| Directory | describes file system information about the file, |
| Entry | including file length, file timestamps, etc.; the |
| | format is specified in Section 5 |
+-----------+-------------------------------------------------------+
The first octet of the Flags field is currently specified for use.
The later two octets are reserved for future use, and MUST be set to
zero.
In the Flags field, the bits labelled 8 and 9 in the figure above
indicate the exact size of the offset descriptor fields used in this
particular packet and are interpreted exactly as the bits 8 and 9 in
the BEACON packet described above. The value of these bits
determines the size of the File Length field in the current packet,
as well as indicating the size of the offset fields used in DATA and
HOLESTOFILL packets within the session that will follow this packet.
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+--------+--------+-------------------------------------------------+
| Bit 10 | Bit 11 | Type of transfer |
+--------+--------+-------------------------------------------------+
| 0 | 0 | a file is being sent. |
| 0 | 1 | the file being sent should be interpreted as a |
| | | directory record. |
| 1 | 0 | a bundle is being sent. |
| 1 | 1 | an indefinite-length stream is being sent. |
+--------+--------+-------------------------------------------------+
Also inside the Flags field, bits 10 and 11 indicate what is being
transferred - a file, special file that contains directory records,
bundle, or stream. The value 01 indicates that the METADATA and DATA
packets are being generated in response to a _getdir_ REQUEST, and
that the assembled DATA contents should be interpreted as a sequence
of Directory Records, as defined in Section 5.
+-----+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| Bit | Value | Meaning |
+-----+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| 12 | 0 | This transfer is in progress. |
| 12 | 1 | This transfer is no longer in progress, and has |
| | | been terminated. |
+-----+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
Bit 12 indicates whether the transfer is in progress, or has been
terminated by the sender. It is normally set to 1 only when METADATA
is resent to indicate that a stream transfer has been ended.
+--------+----------------------------------------------------------+
| Bit 13 | Use |
+--------+----------------------------------------------------------+
| 0 | This file's content MUST be delivered reliably without |
| | errors using UDP. |
| 1 | This file's content MAY be delivered unreliably, without |
| | errors, or partly unreliably, where errors are |
| | tolerated, using UDP-Lite. |
+--------+----------------------------------------------------------+
Bit 13 indicates whether the file must be sent reliably or can be
sent at least partly unreliably, using UDP-Lite. This flag can only
be set if the originator of the file knows that at least some of the
file content is suitable for sending unreliably and is robust to
errors. This flag reflects a property of the file itself. This flag
may still be set if the immediate file-receiver is only capable of
UDP delivery, on the assumption that this preference will be
preserved for later transfers where UDP-Lite transfers may be taken
advantage of by senders with knowledge of the internal file
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structure. The file-sender may know that the receiver is capable of
handling UDP-Lite, either from a _get_ REQUEST, from exchange of
BEACONs, or a-priori.
The high four bits of the Flags field, bits 28-31, are used to
indicate if an error-detection checksum has been included in the
METADATA for the file to be transferred. Here, bits 0000 indicate
that no checksum is present, with the implicit assumption that the
application will do its own end-to-end check. Other values indicate
the type of checksum to use. The choice of checksum depends on the
available computing power and the length of the file to be
checksummed. Longer files require stronger checksums to ensure
error-free delivery. The checksum of the file to be transferred is
carried as shown, with a fixed-length field before the varying-length
File Length and File Name information fields.
Assigned values for the checksum field are:
+-----------+-------------------------------------------------------+
| Value | Use |
| (0-15) | |
+-----------+-------------------------------------------------------+
| 0 | No checksum is provided. |
| 1 | 32-bit CRC32 checksum, suitable for small files. |
| 2 | 128-bit MD5 checksum, suitable for larger files |
| 3 | 160-bit SHA-1 checksum, suitable for larger files but |
| | slower to process than MD5. |
+-----------+-------------------------------------------------------+
It is expected that higher values will be allocated to new and
stronger checksums able to better protect larger files. A checksum
SHOULD be included for files being transferred. The checksum SHOULD
be as strong as possible. Streaming of an indefinite-length stream
MUST set the checksum field to zero.
It is expected that a minimum of the MD5 checksum will be used,
unless the Saratoga implementation is used exclusively for small
transfers at the low end of the 16-bit file descriptor range, such as
on low-performing hardware, where the weaker CRC-32c checksum can
suffice.
The CRC32 checksum is computed as described for the CRC-32c algorithm
given in [RFC3309].
The MD5 Sum field is generated via the MD5 algorithm [RFC1321],
computed over the entire contents of the file being transferred. The
file-receiver can compute the MD5 result over the reassembled
Saratoga DATA packet contents, and compare this to the METADATA's MD5
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Sum field in order to gain confidence that there were no undetected
protocol errors or UDP checksum weaknesses encountered during the
transfer. Although MD5 is known to be less than optimal for security
uses, it remains excellent for non-security use in error detection
(as is done here in Saratoga), and has better performance
implications than cryptographically-stronger alternatives given the
limited available processing of many DTN use cases.
Checksums may be privately keyed for local use, to allow transmission
of authenticated or encrypted files delivered in DATA packets. This
has limitations, discussed further in the Security Considerations
section at end.
Use of the checksum to ensure that a file has been correctly relayed
to the receiving node is important. A provided checksum MUST be
checked against the received data file. If checksum verification
fails, either due to corruption or due to the receiving node not
having the right key for a keyed checksum), the file MUST be
discarded. If the file is to be relayed onwards later to another
Saratoga peer, the metadata, including the checksum, MUST be retained
with the file and SHOULD be retransmitted onwards unchanged with the
file for end-to-end coverage. If it is necessary to recompute the
checksum or encrypted data for the new peer, either because a
different key is in use or the existing checksum algorithm is not
supported, the new checksum MUST be computed before the old checksum
is verified, to ensure overlapping checksum coverage and detect
errors introduced in file storage.
If the METADATA is in response to a _get_ REQUEST including a file
record, and the record information for the held file matches what the
requester already has, as has been indicated by a previously-received
METADATA advertisement from the requester, then only the METADATA is
sent repeating this information and verifying that the file is up to
date. If the record information does not match and a newer file can
be supplied, the METADATA begins a transfer with following DATA
packets to update the file.
4.4. DATA
A series of DATA packets form the main part of a data transfer
transaction (_get_, _put_, or _getdir_). The payloads constitute the
actual file data being transferred.
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Format
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
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
|0 1| Type | Flags |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| Id |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| /
/ Timestamp/nonce information (optional) /
/ /
/ |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
[ Offset (descriptor) ]
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
where
+---------------+---------------------------------------------------+
| Field | Description |
+---------------+---------------------------------------------------+
| Type | 3 |
| Flags 8 and 9 | bit 8 and 9 specify the size of offset |
| | descriptor, as elsewhere. |
| Flag 10 | bit 10, with bit 11, indicates whether a file, |
| | bundle, stream or directory entry is being |
| | carried. This bit will normally be zero for |
| | files. |
| Flag 11 | bit 11 is used with bit 10. Normally this bit |
| | will be zero for files. |
| Flag 12 | bit 12 indicates that an optional timestamp or |
| | nonce is included in the DATA header before the |
| | offset descriptor. |
| Flag 15 | bit 15 requests an immediate HOLESTOFILL ack to |
| | be generated in response to receiving this |
| | packet. |
| Id | identifies the transaction that this packet |
| | belongs to |
| Offset | the offset in octets to the location where the |
| | first byte of this packet's payload is to be |
| | written |
+---------------+---------------------------------------------------+
The DATA packet has a minimum size of ten octets, using sixteen-bit
descriptors and no timestamps.
DATA packets are normally sent error-free using UDP for reliable
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transfer (of both content and delivery). However, for transfers that
can tolerate content errors, DATA packets MAY be sent using UDP-Lite.
If UDP-Lite is used, the file-sender must know that the file-receiver
is capable of handling UDP-Lite, and the file contents to be
transferred should be resilient to errors. The UDP-Lite checksum
MUST protect the Saratoga headers, up to and including the offset
descriptor, and MAY protect more of each packet's payload, depending
on the file-sender's knowledge of the internal structure of the file
and the file's reliability requirements.
Flag bits 8 and 9 are set to indicate the size of the offset
descriptor as described for BEACON and METADATA packets, so that each
DATA packet is self-describing. This allows the DATA packet to be
used to construct a file even when the initial METADATA is lost and
must be resent. The flag values for bits 8, 9, 10 and 11 MUST be the
same as indicated in the initial METADATA packet.
+--------+--------+-------------------------------------------------+
| Bit 10 | Bit 11 | Type of transfer |
+--------+--------+-------------------------------------------------+
| 0 | 0 | a file is being sent. |
| 0 | 1 | the file being sent should be interpreted as a |
| | | directory record. |
| 1 | 0 | a bundle is being sent. |
| 1 | 1 | an indefinite-length stream is being sent. |
+--------+--------+-------------------------------------------------+
Also inside the Flags field, bits 10 and 11 indicate what is being
transferred - a file, special file that contains directory records,
bundle, or stream. The value 01 indicates that the METADATA and DATA
packets are being generated in response to a _getdir_ REQUEST, and
that the assembled DATA contents should be interpreted as a sequence
of Directory Records, as defined in Section 5.
+-----+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| Bit | Value | Meaning |
+-----+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| 12 | 0 | This packet does not include an optional |
| | | timestamp/nonce field. |
| 12 | 1 | This packet includes an optional timestamp/nonce |
| | | field. |
+-----+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
Flag bit 12 indicates that an optional timestamp/nonce is carried in
the packet before the offset field. This timestamp/nonce field is
always sixteen bytes long. Timestamps are particularly useful when
streaming. Timestamps are normally only meaningful to the sender,
and the receiver simply echoes the timestamps back as specified for
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HOLESTOFILL packets. Timestamps are particularly useful when
streaming. Timestamps are discussed further in Appendix A.
+-----+-------+------------------------------------+
| Bit | Value | Meaning |
+-----+-------+------------------------------------+
| 15 | 0 | No response is requested. |
| 15 | 1 | A HOLESTOFILL packet is requested. |
+-----+-------+------------------------------------+
Within the Flags field, if bit 15 of the packet is set, the file-
receiver is to immediately generate a HOLESTOFILL packet to provide
the file-sender with up-to-date information regarding the status of
the file transfer. This flag is set carefully and rarely. It may be
set periodically, but infrequently. Asymmetric links with
constrained backchannels can only carry a limited amount of
HOLESTOFILL packets before ack congestion becomes a problem. This
flag SHOULD NOT be set if an unreliable stream is being transferred,
or if multicast is in use. This flag SHOULD be set periodically for
reliable file transfers, or reliable streaming.
Immediately following the DATA header is the payload, which consumes
the remainder of the packet and whose length is implicitly defined by
the end of the packet. The payload octets are directly formed from
the continuous octets starting at the specified Offset in the file
being transferred. No special coding is performed. A zero-octet
payload length is allowable.
The length of the Offset fields used within all DATA packets for a
given transaction MUST be consistent with the length indicated by
bits 8 and 9 of the transactions METADATA packet. If the METADATA
packet has not yet been received, a file-receiver SHOULD request it
via a HOLESTOFILL packet, and MAY choose to enqueue received DATA
packets for later processing after the METADATA arrives.
4.5. HOLESTOFILL
The HOLESTOFILL packet type is used for feedback from a Saratoga
file-receiver to a Saratoga file-sender to indicate transaction
progress and request transmission (usually re-transmission) of
specific sets of octets within the current transaction (called
"holes"). This can be used to clean up losses (or indicate no
losses) at the end of, or during, a transaction, or to efficiently
resume a transfer that was interrupted in a previous transaction.
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Format
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
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
|1 0| Type | Flags | Status |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| Id |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| /
/ Timestamp/nonce information (optional) /
/ /
/ |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
[ Progress Indicator (descriptor) ]
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
[ In-Response-To (descriptor) ]
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| (possibly, several Hole fields) /
/ ... /
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
where
+----------------+--------------------------------------------------+
| Field | Description |
+----------------+--------------------------------------------------+
| Type | 4 |
| Flags | are defined below. |
| Id | identifies the transaction that this packet |
| | belongs to. |
| Status | a value of 0x00 indicates the transfer is |
| | sucessfully proceeding. All other values are |
| | errors terminating the transfer, explained |
| | below. |
| Zero-Pad | an octet fixed at 0x00 to allow later fields to |
| | be conveniently aligned for processing. |
| Progress | the offset of the lowest-numbered octet of the |
| Indicator | file not yet received. |
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| In-Response-To | This is only present if the timestamp flag is |
| (optional | set. If the HOLESTOFILL packet is voluntary and |
| timestamp) | the voluntary flag is set, this should repeat |
| | the timestamp of the DATA packet containing the |
| | highest offset seen. If the HOLESTOFILL packet |
| | is in response to a mandatory request, this will |
| | repeat the timestamp of the requesting DATA |
| | packet. The file-sender may use these |
| | timestamps to estimate latency. There are |
| | special considerations for streaming, to protect |
| | against the ambiguity of wrapped offset |
| | descriptor sequence numbers, discussed below. |
| In-Response-To | the offset of the highest-numbered octet within |
| (descriptor) | a DATA packet that generated this HOLESTOFILL |
| | packet, or the offset of the highest-numbered |
| | octet seen if this HOLESTOFILL is generated |
| | voluntarily and the voluntary flag is set. |
| Holes | indications of offset ranges of missing data, |
| | defined below. |
+----------------+--------------------------------------------------+
The HOLESTOFILL packet has a minimum size of twelve octets, using
sixteen-bit descriptors, a progress indicator but no Hole fields, and
no timestamps.
The Id field is needed to associate the packet with the transaction
that it refers to. Using the Id as a key, the receiver of a packet
can determine the lengths of the Progress Indicator, In-Response-To,
and Hole offsets used within the HOLESTOFILL packet, as this file
offset descriptor size was set in the initial METADATA packet that
established the Id and in DATA packets that the file receiver is
responding to.
Flags bits 8 and 9 are set to indicate the size of the offset
descriptor as described for BEACON and METADATA packets, so that each
HOLESTOFILL packet is self-describing. The flag values here MUST be
the same as indicated in the initial METADATA and DATA packets.
Other bits in the Flags field are defined as:
+-----+-------+---------------------------------------------------+
| Bit | Value | Meaning |
+-----+-------+---------------------------------------------------+
| 12 | 0 | This packet does not include a timestamp field. |
| 12 | 1 | This packet includes an optional timestamp field. |
+-----+-------+---------------------------------------------------+
Flag bit 12 indicates that an optional sixteen-byte timestamp/nonce
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field is carried in the packet before the Progress Indicator
descriptor, as discussed for the DATA packet format. Timestamps are
discussed further in Appendix A.
+-----+-------+----------------------------------------+
| Bit | Value | Meaning |
+-----+-------+----------------------------------------+
| 13 | 0 | file's METADATA has been received. |
| 13 | 1 | file's METADATA has not been received. |
+-----+-------+----------------------------------------+
If bit 13 of a HOLESTOFILL packet has been set to indicate that the
METADATA has not yet been received, then the METADATA should be
resent. This flag should normally be clear.
+-----+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| Bit | Value | Meaning |
+-----+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| 14 | 0 | this packet contains the complete current set of |
| | | holes at the file-receiver. |
| 14 | 1 | this packet contains incomplete hole-state; holes |
| | | shown in this packet should supplement other |
| | | incomplete hole-state known to the file-sender. |
+-----+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
Bit 14 of the HOLESTOFILL packet is only set when there are too many
holes to fit within a single HOLESTOFILL packet due to MTU
limitations. This causes the hole list to be spread out over
multiple HOLESTOFILL packets, each of which conveys distinct sets of
holes. This could occur, for instance, in a large file _put_
scenario with a long-delay feedback loop and poor physical layer
conditions. These multiple HOLESTOFILL packets will share In-
Response-To information. When losses are light and/or hole reporting
and repair is relatively frequent, all holes should easily fit within
a single HOLESTOFILL packet, and this flag will be clear. Bit 14
should normally be clear.
In some rare cases of high loss, there may be too many holes in the
received data to convey within a single HOLESTOFILL's size, which is
limited by the link MTU size. In this case, multiple HOLESTOFILL
packets may be generated, and Flags bit 14 should be set on each
HOLESTOFILL packet accordingly, to indicate that each packet holds
incomplete results. The complete group of HOLESTOFILL packets, each
containing incomplete information, will share common In-Response-To
information to distinguish them from any earlier groups.
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+-----+-------+----------------------------------------------------+
| Bit | Value | Meaning |
+-----+-------+----------------------------------------------------+
| 15 | 0 | This HOLESTOFILL was requested by the file-sender. |
| 15 | 1 | This HOLESTOFILL is sent voluntarily. |
+-----+-------+----------------------------------------------------+
Flag bit 15 indicates whether the HOLESTOFILL is sent voluntarily or
due to a request by the sender. It affects content of the In-
Response-To timestamp and descriptor fields.
In the case of a transfer proceeding normally, immediately following
the HOLESTOFILL packet header shown above, is a set of "Hole"
definitions. Each Hole definition is a pair of unsigned integers.
For a 32-bit offset descriptor, each Hole definition consists of two
four-octet unsigned integers:
Hole Definition Format
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
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
[ offset to start of hole (descriptor) ]
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
[ offset to end of hole (descriptor) ]
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
The start of the hole means the offset of the first unreceived byte
in that hole. The end of the hole means the last unreceived byte in
that hole.
For 16-bit descriptors, each Hole definition holds two two-octet
unsigned integers, while Hole definitions for 64- and 128-bit
descriptors require two eight- and two sixteen-octet unsigned
integers respectively.
Since each Hole definition takes up eight octets when 32-bit offset
lengths are used, we expect that well over 100 such definitions can
fit in a single HOLESTOFILL packet, given the IPv6 minimum MTU.
A 'voluntary' HOLESTOFILL is sent at the start of each transaction,
once METADATA information has been received. This indicates that the
receiver is ready to receive the file, or indicates an error or
rejection code, described below. A HOLESTOFILL indicating a
successfully established transfer has a Progress Indicator of zero
and an In-Response-To field of zero.
On receiving a HOLESTOFILL packet, the sender SHOULD prioritize
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sending the necessary data to fill those holes, in order to advance
the Progress Indicator at the receiver.
A completed transfer is inferred from the reported receiver window
position. In the final HOLESTOFILL packet sent by the receiver once
the file to be transferred has been completely received, bit 14 MUST
be 0 (indicating a complete set of holes in this packet), there MUST
NOT be any holestofill offset pairs indicating holes, the In-
Response-To field points to the last byte of the file, and the
voluntary flag MUST be set. This 'completed' HOLESTOFILL may be
repeated, depending on subsequent sender behaviour, while internal
state about the transfer remains available to the receiver.
In the case of an error causing a transfer to be aborted, the Status
field holds a code that can be used to explain the cause of the error
to the other peer. A zero value indicates that there have been no
significant errors (this is called a "success HOLESTOFILL" within
this document), while any non-zero value means the transaction should
be aborted (this is called a "failure HOLESTOFILL").
+------------+------------------------------------------------------+
| Status | Meaning |
| Value | |
+------------+------------------------------------------------------+
| 0x00 | Success, No Errors. |
| 0x01 | Unspecified Error. |
| 0x02 | Unable to send file due to resource constraints. |
| 0x03 | Unable to receive file due to resource constraints. |
| 0x04 | File not found. |
| 0x05 | Access Denied. |
| 0x06 | Unknown Id field for transaction. |
| 0x07 | Did not delete file. |
| 0x08 | File length is longer than REQUEST indicates support |
| | for. |
| 0x09 | File offset descriptors do not match expected use or |
| | file length. |
| 0x0A | Unsupported packet type received. |
| 0x0B | DATA flag bits describing transfer have changed |
| | unexpectedly. |
| 0x0C | Receiver is no longer interested in receiving this |
| | file. |
| 0x0D | Receiver wants sender to pause its transfer. |
| 0x0E | Receiver wants sender to resume a previously-paused |
| | transfer. |
+------------+------------------------------------------------------+
The recipient of a failure HOLESTOFILL MUST NOT try to process the
Progress Indicator, In-Response-To, or Hole offsets, because, in some
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types of error conditions, the packet's sender may not have any way
of setting them to the right length for the transaction.
When sending an indefinite-length stream, the possibility of offset
sequence numbers wrapping back to zero must be considered. This can
be protected against by using large offsets, and by the stream
receiver. The receiver MUST separate out holes before the offset
wraps to zero from holes after the wrap, and send Hole definitions in
different HOLESTOFILL packets, with Flag 14 set to mark them as
incomplete. Any Hole straddling a sequence wrap MUST be broken into
two separate Holes, with the second Hole starting at zero. The
timestamps in HOLESTOFILL packets carrying any pre-wrap holes should
be earlier than the timestamp in later packets, and should repeat the
timestamp of the last DATA packet seen for that offset sequence
before the following wrap to zero occurred. Receivers indicate that
they no longer wish to receive streams by sending Status Code 0x0C.
5. The Directory Entry
Directory Entries have two uses within Saratoga:
1. Within a METADATA packet, a Directory Entry is used to give
information about the file being transferred, in order to
facilitate proper reassembly of the file and to help the file-
receiver understand how recently the file may have been created
or modified.
2. When a peer requests a directory listing via a _getdir_ REQUEST,
the other peer generates a file containing a series of one or
more concatenated Directory Entry records, and transfers this
file as it would transfer the response to a normal _get_ REQUEST,
sending the records together within DATA packets. This file may
be either temporary or within-memory and not actually a part of
the host's file system itself.
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Directory Entry Format
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
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
[ Size (descriptor) ]
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| Mtime |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| Ctime |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| Properties | /
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ /
/ /
/ File Path (max 1024 octets,variable length) /
/ ... //
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-//
where
+------------+------------------------------------------------------+
| field | description |
+------------+------------------------------------------------------+
| Size | the size of the file or directory in octets. |
| Mtime | a timestamp showing when the file or directory was |
| | modified. |
| Ctime | a timestamp of the last status change for this file |
| | or directory. |
| Properties | if set, bit 7 of this field indicates that the entry |
| | corresponds to a directory. Bit 6, if set, |
| | indicates that the file is "special". A special |
| | file may not be directly transferable as it |
| | corresponds to a symbolic link, a named pipe, a |
| | device node, or some other "special" filesystem |
| | object. A file-sender may simply choose not to |
| | include these types of files in the results of a |
| | _getdir_ request. |
| File Path | contains the file's name relative within the |
| | requested path of the _getdir_ transaction, a |
| | maximum of 1024-octet UTF-8 string, that is |
| | null-terminated to indicate the beginning of the |
| | next directory entry in _getdir_ results |
+------------+------------------------------------------------------+
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+-------+-------+---------------------+
| Bit 6 | Bit 7 | Properties conveyed |
+-------+-------+---------------------+
| 0 | 0 | normal file. |
| 0 | 1 | normal directory. |
| 1 | 0 | special file. |
| 1 | 1 | special directory. |
+-------+-------+---------------------+
Whether a particular Directory Entry is being interpreted as the
contents of a METADATA packet, or as the result of a _getdir_
transaction, the width of the Size field is the same as that used for
all lengths and offsets within the transfer, given by the METADATA
and DATA Flags bits 8 and 9.
Streams listed in a directory should be marked as special. If a
stream is being transferred, its size is unknown -- otherwise it
would be a file. The size property of a Directory Entry for a stream
is therefore expected to be zero.
It is expected that files are only listed in Directory Entries if
they can be transferred to the requester. An implementation only
capable of receiving small files using 16-bit descriptors will only
see small files capable of being transferred to it when browsing the
filesystem of an implementation capable of larger sizes. Directory
sizes are not sent, and a Size of 0 is given instead for directories.
The "epoch" format used in the timestamps for Mtime and Ctime in file
object records is the number of seconds since January 1, 2000 in UTC,
which is the same epoch used in the DTN Bundle Protocol for
timestamps and postpones wrapping for 30 years beyond typical 1970-
based timestamps. This should include all leapseconds.
A file-receiver should preserve the timestamp information received in
the METADATA for its own copy of the file, to allow newer versions of
files to propagate and supercede older versions.
6. Behavior of a Saratoga Peer
This section describes some details of Saratoga implementations and
uses the RFC 2119 standards language to describe which portions are
needed for interoperability.
6.1. Saratoga Transactions
Following are descriptions of the packet exchanges between two peers
for each type of transaction.
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6.1.1. The _get_ Transaction
1. A peer (the file-receiver) sends a REQUEST packet to its peer
(the file-sender). The Flags bits are set to indicate that this
is not a _delete_ request, nor does the File Path indicate a
directory. Each _get_ transaction corresponds to a single file,
and fetching multiple files requires sending multiple REQUEST
packets and using multiple transaction Ids. If a specific file is
being requested, then its name is filled into the File Path
field, otherwise it is left null and the file-sender will send a
file of its choice.
2. If the request is rejected, then a HOLESTOFILL packet containing
an error code in the Status field is sent and the transaction is
terminated. This HOLESTOFILL packet MUST be sent to reject and
terminate the transaction. The error code MAY make use of the
"Unspecified Error" value for security reasons. Some REQUESTs
might also be rejected for specifying files that are too large to
have their lengths encoded within the maximum integer field width
advertised by bits 8 and 9 of the REQUEST.
3. If the request is accepted, then a HOLESTOFILL packet MUST be
sent with an error code of 0x00 and an In-Response-To field of
zero.
4. Otherwise, if the request is granted, then the file-sender
generates and sends a METADATA packet along with the contents of
the file as a series of DATA packets. In the absence of
HOLESTOFILL packets, if the file-sender believes it has finished
sending the file, it MUST send the last DATA packet with the
Flags bit set requesting a HOLESTOFILL response from the file-
receiver. This can be followed by empty DATA packets with the
Flags bit set requesting a HOLESTOFILL until either a HOLESTOFILL
packet is received, or the inactivity timer expires. All of the
DATA packets MUST use field widths for the file offset descriptor
fields that match what the Flags of the METADATA packet
specified. Some arbitrarily selected DATA packets may have the
Flags bit set that requests a HOLESTOFILL packet. The file-
receiver MAY voluntarily send HOLESTOFILL packets at other times,
where the In-Response-To field MUST set to zero. The file-
receiver SHOULD voluntarily send a HOLESTOFILL packet in response
to the first DATA packet.
5. As the file-receiver takes in the DATA packets, it writes them
into the file locally. The file-receiver keeps track of missing
data in a hole list. Periodically the file sender will set the
ack flag bit in a DATA packet and request a HOLESTOFILL packet
from the file-receiver, with a copy of this hole list. File-
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receivers MUST send a HOLESTOFILL packet immediately in response
to receiving a DATA packet with the Flags bit set requesting a
HOLESTOFILL.
6. If the file-sender receives a HOLESTOFILL packet with a non-zero
number of holes, it re-fetches the file data at the specified
offsets and re-transmits it. If the METADATA packet requires
retransmission, this is indicated by a bit in the HOLESTOFILL
packet, and the METADATA packet is retransmitted. The file-
sender MUST retransmit data from any holes reported by the file-
receiver before proceeding further with new DATA packets.
7. When the file-receiver has fully received the file data and the
METADATA packet, then it sends a HOLESTOFILL packet indicating
that the transaction is complete, and it terminates the
transaction locally, although it MUST persist in responding to
DATA packets requesting HOLESTOFILLs from the file-sender for
some reasonable amount of time.
Given that there may be a high degree of asymmetry in link bandwidth
between the file-sender and file-receiver, the HOLESTOFILL packets
should be carefully generated so as to not congest the feedback path.
This means that both a file-sender should be cautious in setting the
DATA Flags bit requesting HOLESTOFILLs, and also that a file-receiver
should be cautious in gratuitously generating HOLESTOFILL packets of
its own volition. On unidirectional links, a file-sender cannot
reasonably expect to receive HOLESTOFILL packets, so should never
request them.
6.1.2. The _getdir_ Transaction
A _getdir_ transaction proceeds through the same states as the _get_
transaction. The two differences are that the REQUEST has the
directory bit set in its Flags field, and that, rather than
transferring the contents of a file from the file-receiver to the
file-sender, a set of records representing the contents of a
directory are transferred. These can be parsed and dealt with by the
file-receiver as desired. There is no requirement that a Saratoga
peer send the full contents of a directory listing; a peer may filter
the results to only those entries that are actually accessible to the
requesting peer.
For _getdir_ transactions, the METADATA's bits 8 and 9 in the Flags
field specify both the width of the offset and length fields used
within the transfers DATA and HOLESTOFILL packets, and also the width
of file Size fields within Directory Entries in the interpreted
_getdir_ results. These Flags bits are set to the minimum of the
file-sender's locally-supported maximum width and the advertised
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maximum width within the REQUEST packet, and any file system entries
that would normally be contained in the results, but that have sizes
greater than this width can convey, MUST be filtered out.
6.1.3. The _delete_ Transaction
1. A peer sends a REQUEST packet with the bit set indicating that it
is a deletion request and the path to be deleted is filled into
the File Path field. The File Path MUST be filled in for
_delete_ transactions, unlike for _get_ transactions.
2. The other peer replies with a feedback HOLESTOFILL packet having
a Status code that indicates whether the deletion was granted and
occurred successfully (indicated by the 0x00 Status field in a
success HOLESTOFILL), or whether some error occurred (indicated
by the non-zero Status field in a failure HOLESTOFILL). This
HOLESTOFILL packet MUST have no Holes and 16-bit width zero-
valued Progress Indicator and In-Response-To fields.
6.1.4. The _put_ Transaction
A _put_ transaction proceeds exactly as a _get_, except the file-
sender and file-receiver roles are exchanged between peers, and no
REQUEST packet is ever sent. The file-sending end senses that the
transaction is in progress when it receives METADATA or DATA packets
for which it has no knowledge of the Id field. If the file-receiver
decides that it will store and handle this request (at least
provisionally), then it MUST send a voluntary (ie, not requested)
success HOLESTOFILL packet to the file-sender. Otherwise, it sends a
failure HOLESTOFILL packet. After sending a failure HOLESTOFILL
packet, it may ignore future packets with the same Id field from the
file-sender, but it should, at a low rate, periodically regenerate
the failure HOLESTOFILL packet if the flow of packets does not stop.
6.2. Beacons
Sending BEACON packets is not needed in any of the transactions
discussed in this specification, but optional BEACONs can provide
useful information in many situations. If a node periodically
generates BEACON packets, then it should do so at a low rate which
does not significantly affect in-progress data transfers.
A node that supports multiple versions of Saratoga (e.g. version 1
from this specification along with the older version 0), MAY send
multiple BEACON packets showing different version numbers. The
version number in a single BEACON should not be used to infer the
larger set of protocol versions that a peer is compatible with.
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If a node receives BEACONs from a peer, then it SHOULD NOT attempt to
start any _get_, _getdir_, or _delete_ transactions with that peer if
bit 14 is not set in the latest received BEACONs. Likewise, if
received BEACONs from a peer do not have bit 15 set, then _put_
transactions SHOULD NOT be attempted to that peer. Unlike the
capabilities bits which prevent certain types of transactions from
being attempted, the willingness bits are advisory, and transactions
MAY be attempted even if the node is not advertising a willingness,
as long as it advertises a capability. This avoids waiting for a
willingness indication across long-delay links.
6.3. Upper-Layer Interface
No particular interface functionality is required in implementations
of this specification. The means and degree of access to Saratoga
configuration settings and transaction control that is offered to
upper layers and applications is completely implementation-dependent.
In general, it is expected that upper layers (or users) can set
timeout values for transaction requests and for inactivity periods
during the transaction, on a per-peer or per-transaction basis, but
in some implementations where the Saratoga code is restricted to run
only over certain interfaces with well-understood operational latency
bounds, then these timers MAY be hard-coded.
6.4. Inactivity Timer
In order to determine the liveliness of a transaction, Saratoga nodes
may implement an inactivity timer for each peer they are expecting to
see packets from. For each packet received from a peer, its
associated inactivity timer is reset. If no packets are received for
some amount of time, and the inactivity timer expires, this serves as
a signal to the node that it should abort (and optionally retry) any
sessions that were in progress with the peer. Information from the
link interface (i.e. link down) can override this timer for point-to-
point links.
The actual length of time that the inactivity timer runs for is a
matter of both implementation and deployment situation. Relatively
short timers (on the order of several round-trip times) allow nodes
to quickly react to loss of contact, while longer timers allow for
transaction robustness in the presence of transient link problems.
This document deliberately does not specify a particular inactivity
timer value nor any rules for setting the inactivity timer, because
the protocol is intended to be used in both long- and short-delay
regimes.
Specifically, the inactivity timer is started on sending REQUEST or
HOLESTOFILL packets. When sending packets not expected to elicit
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responses (BEACON, METADATA, or DATA without acknowledgement
requests), there is no point to starting the local inactivity timer.
For normal file transfers, there are simple rules for handling
expiration of the inactivity timer during a _get_ or _put_
transaction. The file-sender SHOULD terminate the transaction state
and cease to send DATA or METADATA packets. The file-receiver SHOULD
stop sending HOLESTOFILL packets, and MAY choose to store the file in
some cache location so that the transfer can be recovered. This is
possible by waiting for an opportunity to re-attempt the transaction
and immediately sending a HOLESTOFILL that only lists the parts of
the file not yet received if the transaction is granted. In any
case, a partially-received file MUST NOT be handled in any way that
would allow another application to think it is complete.
The file-sender may implement more complex timers to allow rate-based
pacing or simple congestion control using information provided in
HOLESTOFILL packets, but such possible timers and their effects are
deliberately not specified here.
7. Mailing list
There is a mailing list for discussion of Saratoga and its
implementations. Contact Lloyd Wood for details.
8. Security Considerations
The design of Saratoga provides limited, deliberately lightweight,
services for authentication of session requests, and for
authentication or encryption of data files via keyed metadata
checksums. This document does not specify privacy or access control
for data files transferred. Privacy, access, authentication and
encryption issues may be addressed within an implementation or
deployment in several ways that do not affect the file transfer
protocol itself. As examples, IPsec may be used to protect Saratoga
implementations from forged packets, to provide privacy, or to
authenticate the identity of a peer. Other implementation-specific
or configuration-specific mechanisms and policies might also be
employed for authentication and authorization of requests.
Protection of file data and meta-data can also be provided by a
higher-level file encryption facility. If IPsec is not required, use
of encryption before the file is given to Saratoga is preferable.
Basic security practices like not accepting paths with "..", not
following symbolic links, and using a chroot() system call, among
others, should also be considered within an implementation.
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Note that Saratoga is intended solely for single-hop transfers
between peers. A METADATA checksum using a previously shared key can
be used to decrypt or authenticate delivered DATA files. Saratoga
can only provide encryption across a single link, not end-to-end
across concatenated links through untrusted peers, as checksum
verification of file integrity is required at each node. End-to-end
data encryption, if required, MUST be implemented by the application
using Saratoga.
9. IANA Considerations
IANA has allocated port 7542 (tcp/udp) for use by Saratoga.
saratoga 7542/tcp Saratoga Transfer Protocol
saratoga 7542/udp Saratoga Transfer Protocol
IANA has allocated a dedicated IPv4 all-hosts multicast address
(224.0.0.108) and a dedicated IPv6 link-local multicast addresses
(FF02:0:0:0:0:0:0:6c) for use by Saratoga.
10. Acknowledgements
Developing and deploying the on-orbit IP infrastructure of the
Disaster Monitoring Constellation, in which Saratoga has proven
useful, has taken the efforts of hundreds of people over more than a
decade. We thank them all.
Work on this document at NASA's Glenn Research Center was funded by
NASA's Earth Science Technology Office (ESTO).
We thank Stewart Bryant, Cathryn Peoples and Charles Smith for their
review comments. We regard Charles as a named coauthor of this work.
11. A Note on Naming
Saratoga is named for the USS Saratoga (CV-3), the aircraft carrier
sunk at Bikini Atoll that is now a popular diving site.
12. References
12.1. Normative References
[RFC0768] Postel, J., "User Datagram Protocol", STD 6, RFC 768,
August 1980.
Wood, et al. Expires November 9, 2010 [Page 41]
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[RFC1321] Rivest, R., "The MD5 Message-Digest Algorithm", RFC 1321,
April 1992.
[RFC2119] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, March 1997.
[RFC3309] Stone, J., Stewart, R., and D. Otis, "Stream Control
Transmission Protocol (SCTP) Checksum Change", RFC 3309,
September 2002.
[RFC3629] Yergeau, F., "UTF-8, a transformation format of ISO
10646", STD 63, RFC 3629, November 2003.
[RFC3828] Larzon, L-A., Degermark, M., Pink, S., Jonsson, L-E., and
G. Fairhurst, "The Lightweight User Datagram Protocol
(UDP-Lite)", RFC 3828, July 2004.
12.2. Informative References
[Hogie05] Hogie, K., Criscuolo, E., and R. Parise, "Using Standard
Internet Protocols and Applications in Space", Computer
Networks, Special Issue on Interplanetary Internet, vol.
47, no. 5, pp. 603-650, April 2005.
[I-D.ietf-ledbat-congestion]
Shalunov, S., "Low Extra Delay Background Transport
(LEDBAT)", draft-ietf-ledbat-congestion-01 (work in
progress), March 2010.
[I-D.wood-dtnrg-http-dtn-delivery]
Wood, L. and P. Holliday, "Using HTTP for delivery in
Delay/Disruption-Tolerant Networks",
draft-wood-dtnrg-http-dtn-delivery-05 (work in progress) ,
May 2010.
[I-D.wood-dtnrg-saratoga]
Wood, L., McKim, J., Eddy, W., Ivancic, W., and C.
Jackson, "Using Saratoga with a Bundle Agent as a
Convergence Layer for Delay-Tolerant Networking",
draft-wood-dtnrg-saratoga-07 (work in progress) ,
May 2010.
[Jackson04]
Jackson, C., "Saratoga File Transfer Protocol", Surrey
Satellite Technology Ltd internal technical document ,
2004.
[RFC0959] Postel, J. and J. Reynolds, "File Transfer Protocol",
Wood, et al. Expires November 9, 2010 [Page 42]
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STD 9, RFC 959, October 1985.
[RFC3366] Fairhurst, G. and L. Wood, "Advice to link designers on
link Automatic Repeat reQuest (ARQ)", BCP 62, RFC 3366,
August 2002.
[RFC3448] Handley, M., Floyd, S., Padhye, J., and J. Widmer, "TCP
Friendly Rate Control (TFRC): Protocol Specification",
RFC 3448, January 2003.
[RFC5050] Scott, K. and S. Burleigh, "Bundle Protocol
Specification", RFC 5050, November 2007.
[Wood07a] Wood, L., Ivancic, W., Hodgson, D., Miller, E., Conner,
B., Lynch, S., Jackson, C., da Silva Curiel, A., Cooke,
D., Shell, D., Walke, J., and D. Stewart, "Using Internet
Nodes and Routers Onboard Satellites", International
Journal of Satellite Communications and
Networking, Special Issue on Space Networks, vol. 25, no.
2, pp. 195-216, March/April 2007.
[Wood07b] Wood, L., Eddy, W., Ivancic, W., Miller, E., McKim, J.,
and C. Jackson, "Saratoga: a Delay-Tolerant Networking
convergence layer with efficient link utilization",
International Workshop on Satellite and Space
Communications (IWSSC '07) Salzburg, September 2007.
Appendix A. Appendix: Timestamp/Nonce field considerations
The format of optional timestamps is implementation-dependent. How
the contents of this timestamp field are used and interpreted depends
on local needs and conventions and the local implementation.
However, one simple suggested format for timestamps is to begin with
a POSIX time_t representation of time, in network byte order. This
is either a 32-bit or 64-bit signed integer representing the number
of seconds since 1970. The remainder of this field can be used
either for a representation of elapsed time within the current
second, if that level of accuracy is required, or as a nonce field
uniquely identifying the packet or including other information. Any
locally-meaningful flags identifying a type of timestamp or timebase
can be included before the end of the field. Unused parts of this
field MUST be set to zero.
There are many different representations of timestamps and timebases,
and this draft is too short to cover them in detail. One suggested
flag representation of different timestamp fields is to use the least
significant bits at the end of the timestamp/nonce field as:
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+---------+---------------------------------------------------------+
| Status | Meaning |
| Value | |
+---------+---------------------------------------------------------+
| 0x00 | No flags set, local interpretation of field. |
| 0x01 | 32-bit timestamp at start of field indicating whole |
| | seconds from epoch. |
| 0x02 | 64-bit timestamp at start of field indicating whole |
| | seconds elapsed from epoch. |
| 0x03 | 32-bit timestamp, as in 0x01, followed by 32-bit |
| | timestamp indicating fraction of the second elapsed. |
| 0x04 | 64-bit timestamp, as in 0x02, followed by 32-bit |
| | timestamp indicating fraction of the second elapsed. |
+---------+---------------------------------------------------------+
Other values may indicate specific epochs or timebases, as local
requirements dictate. There are many ways to define and use time
usefully.
Timestamp values provide a useful mechanism for Saratoga peers to
measure path and round-trip latency. The use of timestamp values may
assist in developing algorithms for flow control (including TCP-
Friendly Rate Control) or other purposes.
Authors' Addresses
Lloyd Wood
Centre for Communication Systems Research, University of Surrey
Guildford, Surrey GU2 7XH
United Kingdom
Phone: +44-1483-698123
Email: L.Wood@surrey.ac.uk
Jim McKim
RS Information Systems
NASA Glenn Research Center
21000 Brookpark Road, MS 142-1
Cleveland, OH 44135
USA
Phone: +1-216-433-6536
Email: James.H.McKim@grc.nasa.gov
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Wesley M. Eddy
MTI Systems
MS 500-ASRC
NASA Glenn Research Center
21000 Brookpark Road, MS 54-5
Cleveland, OH 44135
USA
Phone: +1-216-433-6682
Email: wes@mti-systems.com
Will Ivancic
NASA Glenn Research Center
21000 Brookpark Road, MS 54-5
Cleveland, OH 44135
USA
Phone: +1-216-433-3494
Email: William.D.Ivancic@grc.nasa.gov
Chris Jackson
Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd
Tycho House
Surrey Space Centre
20 Stephenson Road
Guildford, Surrey GU2 7YE
United Kingdom
Phone: +44-1483-803-803
Email: C.Jackson@sstl.co.uk
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