Constrained Application Protocol (CoAP) Option for No Server Response
RFC 7967
| Document | Type |
RFC - Informational
(August 2016; No errata)
Was draft-tcs-coap-no-response-option (individual)
|
|
|---|---|---|---|
| Authors | Abhijan Bhattacharyya , Soma Bandyopadhyay , Arpan Pal , Tulika Bose | ||
| Last updated | 2018-12-20 | ||
| Stream | Independent Submission | ||
| Formats | plain text html pdf htmlized bibtex | ||
| IETF conflict review | conflict-review-tcs-coap-no-response-option | ||
| Stream | ISE state | Published RFC | |
| Consensus Boilerplate | Unknown | ||
| Document shepherd | Adrian Farrel | ||
| Shepherd write-up | Show (last changed 2016-06-07) | ||
| IESG | IESG state | RFC 7967 (Informational) | |
| Telechat date | |||
| Responsible AD | (None) | ||
| Send notices to | "Nevil Brownlee" <rfc-ise@rfc-editor.org> | ||
| IANA | IANA review state | IANA OK - Actions Needed | |
| IANA action state | RFC-Ed-Ack | ||
Independent Submission A. Bhattacharyya
Request for Comments: 7967 S. Bandyopadhyay
Category: Informational A. Pal
ISSN: 2070-1721 T. Bose
Tata Consultancy Services Ltd.
August 2016
Constrained Application Protocol (CoAP) Option for No Server Response
Abstract
There can be machine-to-machine (M2M) scenarios where server
responses to client requests are redundant. This kind of open-loop
exchange (with no response path from the server to the client) may be
desired to minimize resource consumption in constrained systems while
updating many resources simultaneously or performing high-frequency
updates. CoAP already provides Non-confirmable (NON) messages that
are not acknowledged by the recipient. However, the request/response
semantics still require the server to respond with a status code
indicating "the result of the attempt to understand and satisfy the
request", per RFC 7252.
This specification introduces a CoAP option called 'No-Response'.
Using this option, the client can explicitly express to the server
its disinterest in all responses against the particular request.
This option also provides granular control to enable expression of
disinterest to a particular response class or a combination of
response classes. The server MAY decide to suppress the response by
not transmitting it back to the client according to the value of the
No-Response option in the request. This option may be effective for
both unicast and multicast requests. This document also discusses a
few examples of applications that benefit from this option.
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Status of This Memo
This document is not an Internet Standards Track specification; it is
published for informational purposes.
This is a contribution to the RFC Series, independently of any other
RFC stream. The RFC Editor has chosen to publish this document at
its discretion and makes no statement about its value for
implementation or deployment. Documents approved for publication by
the RFC Editor are not a candidate for any level of Internet
Standard; see Section 2 of RFC 7841.
Information about the current status of this document, any errata,
and how to provide feedback on it may be obtained at
http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc7967.
Copyright Notice
Copyright (c) 2016 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
publication of this document. Please review these documents
carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect
to this document.
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Table of Contents
1. Introduction ....................................................3
1.1. Potential Benefits .........................................4
1.2. Terminology ................................................4
2. Option Definition ...............................................5
2.1. Granular Control over Response Suppression .................5
2.2. Method-Specific Applicability Considerations ...............8
3. Miscellaneous Aspects ...........................................9
3.1. Reusing Tokens .............................................9
3.2. Taking Care of Congestion Control and Server-Side
Flow Control ..............................................10
3.3. Considerations regarding Caching of Responses .............11
3.4. Handling the No-Response Option for a HTTP-to-CoAP
Reverse Proxy .............................................11
4. Application Scenarios ..........................................12
4.1. Frequent Update of Geolocation from Vehicles to
Backend Server ............................................12
4.1.1. Using No-Response with PUT .........................13
4.1.2. Using No-Response with POST ........................14
4.1.2.1. POST Updating a Fixed Target Resource .....14
4.1.2.2. POST Updating through Query String ........15
4.2. Multicasting Actuation Command from a Handheld Device
to a Group of Appliances ..................................15
4.2.1. Using Granular Response Suppression ................16
5. IANA Considerations ............................................16
6. Security Considerations ........................................16
7. References .....................................................16
7.1. Normative References ......................................16
7.2. Informative References ....................................17
Acknowledgments ...................................................18
Authors' Addresses ................................................18
1. Introduction
This specification defines a new option for the Constrained
Application Protocol (CoAP) [RFC7252] called 'No-Response'. This
option enables clients to explicitly express their disinterest in
receiving responses back from the server. The disinterest can be
expressed at the granularity of response classes (e.g., 2.xx) or a
combination of classes (e.g., 2.xx and 5.xx). By default, this
option indicates interest in all response classes. The server MAY
decide to suppress the response by not transmitting it back to the
client according to the value of the No-Response option in the
request.
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Along with the technical details, this document presents some
practical application scenarios that highlight the usefulness of this
option. [ITS-LIGHT] and [CoAP-ADAPT] contain the background research
for this document.
In this document, when it is mentioned that a request from a client
is with No-Response, the intended meaning is that the client
expresses its disinterest for all or some selected classes of
responses.
1.1. Potential Benefits
The use of the No-Response option should be driven by typical
application requirements and, particularly, characteristics of the
information to be updated. If this option is opportunistically used
in a fitting M2M application, then the concerned system may benefit
in the following aspects. (However, note that this option is
elective, and servers can simply ignore the preference expressed by
the client.)
* Reduction in network congestion due to effective reduction of
the overall traffic.
* Reduction in server-side load by relieving the server from
responding to requests for which responses are not necessary.
* Reduction in battery consumption at the constrained
endpoint(s).
* Reduction in overall communication cost.
1.2. Terminology
The terms used in this document are in conformance with those defined
in [RFC7252].
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 [RFC2119].
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2. Option Definition
The properties of the No-Response option are given in Table 1. In
this table, the C, U, N, and R columns indicate the properties
Critical, Unsafe, NoCacheKey, and Repeatable, respectively.
+--------+---+---+---+---+-------------+--------+--------+---------+
| Number | C | U | N | R | Name | Format | Length | Default |
+--------+---+---+---+---+-------------+--------+--------+---------+
| 258 | | X | - | | No-Response | uint | 0-1 | 0 |
+--------+---+---+---+---+-------------+--------+--------+---------+
Table 1: Option Properties
This option is a request option. It is elective and not repeatable.
This option is Unsafe-to-Forward, as the intermediary MUST know how
to interpret this option. Otherwise, the intermediary (without
knowledge about the special unidirectional nature of the request)
would wait for responses.
Note: Since CoAP maintains a clear separation between the
request/response and the message sub-layer, this option does not
have any dependency on the type of message
(Confirmable/Non-confirmable). So, even the absence of a message
sub-layer (e.g., CoAP over TCP [CoAP-TCP-TLS]) should have no
effect on the interpretation of this option. However, considering
the CoAP-over-UDP scenario [RFC7252], NON messages are best suited
to this option because of the expected benefits. Using
No-Response with NON messages gets rid of any kind of reverse
traffic, and the interaction becomes completely open loop.
Using this option with CON requests may not serve the desired
purpose if piggybacked responses are triggered. But, if the
server responds with a separate response (which, perhaps, the
client does not care about), then this option can be useful.
Suppressing the separate response reduces traffic by one
additional CoAP message in this case.
This option contains values to indicate disinterest in all or a
particular class or combination of classes of responses as described
in Section 2.1.
2.1. Granular Control over Response Suppression
This option enables granular control over response suppression by
allowing the client to express its disinterest in a typical class or
combination of classes of responses. For example, a client may
explicitly tell the receiver that no response is required unless
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something 'bad' happens and a response of class 4.xx or 5.xx is to be
fed back to the client. No response of the class 2.xx is required in
such case.
Note: Section 2.7 of [RFC7390] describes a scheme where a server in
the multicast group may decide on its own to suppress responses
for group communication with granular control. The client does
not have any knowledge about that. However, on the other hand,
the No-Response option enables the client to explicitly inform the
servers about its disinterest in responses. Such explicit control
on the client side may be helpful for debugging network resources.
An example scenario is described in Section 4.2.1.
The server MUST send back responses of the classes for which the
client has not expressed any disinterest. There may be instances
where a server, on its own, decides to suppress responses. An
example is suppression of responses by multicast servers as described
in Section 2.7 of [RFC7390]. If such a server receives a request
with a No-Response option showing 'interest' in specific response
classes (i.e., not expressing disinterest for these options), then
any default behavior of suppressing responses, if present, MUST be
overridden to deliver those responses that are of interest to the
client.
So, for example, suppose a multicast server suppresses all responses
by default and receives a request with a No-Response option
expressing disinterest in 2.xx (success) responses only. Note that
the option value naturally expresses interest in error responses 4.xx
and 5.xx in this case. Thus, the server must send back a response if
the concerned request caused an error.
The option value is defined as a bit map (Table 2) to achieve
granular suppression. Its length can be 0 bytes (empty) or 1 byte.
+-------+-----------------------+-----------------------------------+
| Value | Binary Representation | Description |
+-------+-----------------------+-----------------------------------+
| 0 | <empty> | Interested in all responses. |
+-------+-----------------------+-----------------------------------+
| 2 | 00000010 | Not interested in 2.xx responses. |
+-------+-----------------------+-----------------------------------+
| 8 | 00001000 | Not interested in 4.xx responses. |
+-------+-----------------------+-----------------------------------+
| 16 | 00010000 | Not interested in 5.xx responses. |
+-------+-----------------------+-----------------------------------+
Table 2: Option Values
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The conventions used in deciding the option values are:
1. To suppress an individual class: Set bit number (n-1) starting
from the least significant bit (bit number 0) to suppress all
responses belonging to class n.xx. So,
option value to suppress n.xx class = 2**(n-1)
2. To suppress a combination of classes: Set each corresponding bit
according to point 1 above. Example: The option value will be 18
(binary: 00010010) to suppress both 2.xx and 5.xx responses.
This is essentially bitwise OR of the corresponding individual
values for suppressing 2.xx and 5.xx. The "CoAP Response Codes"
registry (see Section 12.1.2 of [RFC7252]) defines 2.xx, 4.xx,
and 5.xx responses. So, an option value of 26 (binary: 00011010)
will request to suppress all response codes defined in [RFC7252].
Note: When No-Response is used with value 26 in a request, the client
endpoint SHOULD cease listening to response(s) to the particular
request. On the other hand, showing interest in at least one
class of response means that the client endpoint can no longer
completely cease listening activity and must be configured to
listen during some application specific time-out period for the
particular request. The client endpoint never knows whether the
present request will be a success or a failure. Thus, for
example, if the client decides to open up the response for errors
(4.xx and 5.xx), then it has to wait for the entire time-out
period -- even for the instances where the request is successful
(and the server is not supposed to send back a response). Note
that in this context there may be situations when the response to
errors might get lost. In such a situation, the client would wait
during the time-out period but would not receive any response.
However, this should not give the client the impression that the
request was necessarily successful. In other words, in this case,
the client cannot distinguish between response suppression and
message loss. The application designer needs to tackle this
situation. For example, while performing frequent updates, the
client may strategically interweave requests without No-Response
option into a series of requests with No-Response to check
periodically that things are fine at the server end and the server
is actively responding.
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2.2. Method-Specific Applicability Considerations
The following table provides a ready reference on the possible
applicability of this option with four REST methods. This table is
for the type of possible interactions foreseen at the time of
preparing this specification. The key words from RFC 2119 such as
"SHOULD NOT", etc., deliberately have not been used in this table
because it only contains suggestions.
+-------------+----------------------------------------------------+
| Method Name | Remarks on Applicability |
+-------------+----------------------------------------------------+
| | This should not be used with a conventional GET |
| | request when the client requests the contents |
| | of a resource. However, this option may be useful |
| | for exceptional cases where GET requests have side |
| GET | effects. For instance, the proactive cancellation |
| | procedure for observing a request [RFC7641] |
| | requires a client to issue a GET request with the |
| | Observe option set to 1 ('deregister'). If it is |
| | more efficient to use this deregistration instead |
| | of reactive cancellation (rejecting the next |
| | notification with RST), the client MAY express its |
| | disinterest in the response to such a GET request. |
+-------------+----------------------------------------------------+
| | Suitable for frequent updates (particularly in NON |
| | messages) on existing resources. Might not be |
| | useful when PUT is used to create a new resource, |
| | as it may be important for the client to know that |
| PUT | the resource creation was actually successful in |
| | order to carry out future actions. Also, it may be|
| | important to ensure that a resource was actually |
| | created rather than updating an existing resource. |
+-------------+----------------------------------------------------+
| | If POST is used to update a target resource, |
| | then No-Response can be used in the same manner as |
| | in PUT. This option may also be useful while |
| POST | updating through query strings rather than updating|
| | a fixed target resource (see Section 4.1.2.2 for an|
| | example). |
+-------------+----------------------------------------------------+
| | Deletion is usually a permanent action. If the |
| DELETE | client wants to ensure that the deletion request |
| | was properly executed, then this option should not |
| | be used with the request. |
+-------------+----------------------------------------------------+
Table 3: Suggested Applicability of No-Response with REST Methods
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3. Miscellaneous Aspects
This section further describes important implementation aspects worth
considering while using the No-Response option. The following
discussion contains guidelines and requirements (derived by combining
[RFC7252], [RFC7390], and [RFC5405]) for the application developer.
3.1. Reusing Tokens
Tokens provide a matching criteria between a request and the
corresponding response. The life of a Token starts when it is
assigned to a request and ends when the final matching response is
received. Then, the Token can again be reused. However, a request
with No-Response typically does not have any guaranteed response
path. So, the client has to decide on its own about when it can
retire a Token that has been used in an earlier request so that the
Token can be reused in a future request. Since the No-Response
option is 'elective', a server that has not implemented this option
will respond back. This leads to the following two scenarios:
The first scenario is when the client is never going to care about
any response coming back or about relating the response to the
original request. In that case, it MAY reuse the Token value at
liberty.
However, as a second scenario, let us consider that the client sends
two requests where the first request is with No-Response and the
second request (with the same Token) is without No-Response. In this
case, a delayed response to the first one can be interpreted as a
response to the second request (client needs a response in the second
case) if the time interval between using the same Token is not long
enough. This creates a problem in the request-response semantics.
The most ideal solution would be to always use a unique Token for
requests with No-Response. But if a client wants to reuse a Token,
then in most practical cases the client implementation SHOULD
implement an application-specific reuse time after which it can reuse
the Token. A minimum reuse time for Tokens with a similar expression
as in Section 2.5 of [RFC7390] SHOULD be used:
TOKEN_REUSE_TIME = NON_LIFETIME + MAX_SERVER_RESPONSE_DELAY +
MAX_LATENCY
NON_LIFETIME and MAX_LATENCY are defined in Section 4.8.2 of
[RFC7252]. MAX_SERVER_RESPONSE_DELAY has the same interpretation as
in Section 2.5 of [RFC7390] for a multicast request. For a unicast
request, since the message is sent to only one server,
MAX_SERVER_RESPONSE_DELAY means the expected maximum response delay
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from the particular server to that client that sent the request. For
multicast requests, MAX_SERVER_RESPONSE_DELAY has the same
interpretation as in Section 2.5 of [RFC7390]. So, for multicast it
is the expected maximum server response delay "over all servers that
the client can send a multicast request to", per [RFC7390]. This
response delay for a given server includes its specific Leisure
period; where Leisure is defined in Section 8.2 of [RFC7252]. In
general, the Leisure for a server may not be known to the client. A
lower bound for Leisure, lb_Leisure, is defined in [RFC7252], but not
an upper bound as is needed in this case. Therefore, the upper bound
can be estimated by taking N (N>>1) times the lower bound lb_Leisure:
lb_Leisure = S * G / R
where
S = estimated response size
G = group size estimate
R = data transfer rate
Any estimate of MAX_SERVER_RESPONSE_DELAY MUST be larger than
DEFAULT_LEISURE, as defined in [RFC7252].
Note: If it is not possible for the client to get a reasonable
estimate of the MAX_SERVER_RESPONSE_DELAY, then the client, to be
safe, SHOULD use a unique Token for each stream of messages.
3.2. Taking Care of Congestion Control and Server-Side Flow Control
This section provides guidelines for basic congestion control.
Better congestion control mechanisms can be designed as future work.
If this option is used with NON messages, then the interaction
becomes completely open loop. The absence of any feedback from the
server-end affects congestion-control mechanisms. In this case, the
communication pattern maps to the scenario where the application
cannot maintain an RTT estimate as described in Section 3.1.2 of
[RFC5405]. Hence, per [RFC5405], a 3-second interval is suggested as
the minimum interval between successive updates, and it is suggested
to use an even less aggressive rate when possible. However, in case
of a higher rate of updates, the application MUST have some knowledge
about the channel, and an application developer MUST interweave
occasional closed-loop exchanges (e.g., NON messages without
No-Response, or CON messages) to get an RTT estimate between the
endpoints.
Interweaving requests without No-Response is a MUST in case of an
aggressive request rate for applications where server-side flow
control is necessary. For example, as proposed in [CoAP-PUBSUB], a
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broker MAY return 4.29 (Too Many Requests) in order to request a
client to slow down the request rate. Interweaving requests without
No-Response allows the client to listen to such a response.
3.3. Considerations regarding Caching of Responses
The cacheability of CoAP responses does not depend on the request
method, but it depends on the Response Code. The No-Response option
does not lead to any impact on cacheability of responses. If a
request containing No-Response triggers a cacheable response, then
the response MUST be cached. However, the response MAY not be
transmitted considering the value of the No-Response option in the
request.
For example, if a request with No-Response triggers a cacheable
response of 4.xx class with Max-Age not equal to 0, then the response
must be cached. The cache will return the response to subsequent
similar requests without No-Response as long as the Max-Age has not
elapsed.
3.4. Handling the No-Response Option for a HTTP-to-CoAP Reverse Proxy
A HTTP-to-CoAP reverse proxy MAY translate an incoming HTTP request
to a corresponding CoAP request indicating that no response is
required (showing disinterest in all classes of responses) based on
some application-specific requirement. In this case, it is
RECOMMENDED that the reverse proxy generate an HTTP response with
status code 204 (No Content) when such response is allowed. The
generated response is sent after the proxy has successfully sent out
the CoAP request.
If the reverse proxy applies No-Response for one or more classes of
responses, it will wait for responses up to an application-specific
maximum time (T_max) before responding to the HTTP side. If a
response of a desired class is received within T_max, then the
response gets translated to HTTP as defined in [HTTP-to-CoAP].
However, if the proxy does not receive any response within T_max, it
is RECOMMENDED that the reverse Proxy send an HTTP response with
status code 204 (No Content) when allowed for the specific HTTP
request method.
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4. Application Scenarios
This section describes some examples of application scenarios that
may potentially benefit from the use of the No-Response option.
4.1. Frequent Update of Geolocation from Vehicles to Backend Server
Let us consider an intelligent traffic system (ITS) consisting of
vehicles equipped with a sensor gateway comprising sensors like GPS
and accelerometer sensors. The sensor gateway acts as a CoAP client.
It connects to the Internet using a low-bandwidth cellular connection
(e.g., General Packet Radio Service (GPRS)). The GPS coordinates of
the vehicle are periodically updated to the backend server.
While performing frequent location updates, retransmitting (through
the CoAP CON mechanism) a location coordinate that the vehicle has
already left is not efficient as it adds redundant traffic to the
network. Therefore, the updates are done using NON messages.
However, given the huge number of vehicles updating frequently, the
NON exchange will also trigger a huge number of responses from the
backend. Thus, the cumulative load on the network will be quite
significant. Also, the client in this case may not be interested in
getting responses to location update requests for a location it has
already passed and when the next location update is imminent.
On the contrary, if the client endpoints on the vehicles explicitly
declare that they do not need any status response back from the
server, then load will be reduced significantly. The assumption is
that the high rate of updates will compensate for the stray losses in
geolocation reports.
Note: It may be argued that the above example application can also be
implemented using the Observe option [RFC7641] with NON
notifications. But, in practice, implementing with Observe would
require lot of bookkeeping at the data collection endpoint at the
backend (observer). The observer needs to maintain all the
observe relationships with each vehicle. The data collection
endpoint may be unable to know all its data sources beforehand.
The client endpoints at vehicles may go offline or come back
online randomly. In the case of Observe, the onus is always on
the data collection endpoint to establish an observe relationship
with each data source. On the other hand, implementation will be
much simpler if initiating is left to the data source to carry out
updates using the No-Response option. Another way of looking at
it is that the implementation choice depends on where there is
interest to initiate the update. In an Observe scenario, the
interest is expressed by the data consumer. In contrast, the
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classic update case applies when the interest is from the data
producer. The No-Response option makes classic updates consume
even less resources.
The following subsections illustrate some sample exchanges based on
the application described above.
4.1.1. Using No-Response with PUT
Each vehicle is assigned a dedicated resource "vehicle-stat-<n>",
where <n> can be any string uniquely identifying the vehicle. The
update requests are sent using NON messages. The No-Response option
causes the server not to respond back.
Client Server
| |
| |
+----->| Header: PUT (T=NON, Code=0.03, MID=0x7d38)
| PUT | Token: 0x53
| | Uri-Path: "vehicle-stat-00"
| | Content Type: text/plain
| | No-Response: 26
| | Payload:
| | "VehID=00&RouteID=DN47&Lat=22.5658745&Long=88.4107966667&
| | Time=2013-01-13T11:24:31"
| |
[No response from the server. Next update in 20 s.]
| |
+----->| Header: PUT (T=NON, Code=0.03, MID=0x7d39)
| PUT | Token: 0x54
| | Uri-Path: "vehicle-stat-00"
| | Content Type: text/plain
| | No-Response: 26
| | Payload:
| | "VehID=00&RouteID=DN47&Lat=22.5649015&Long=88.4103511667&
| | Time=2013-01-13T11:24:51"
Figure 1: Example of Unreliable Update with No-Response Option
Using PUT
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4.1.2. Using No-Response with POST
4.1.2.1. POST Updating a Fixed Target Resource
In this case, POST acts the same way as PUT. The exchanges are the
same as above. The updated values are carried as payload of POST as
shown in Figure 2.
Client Server
| |
| |
+----->| Header: POST (T=NON, Code=0.02, MID=0x7d38)
| POST | Token: 0x53
| | Uri-Path: "vehicle-stat-00"
| | Content Type: text/plain
| | No-Response: 26
| | Payload:
| | "VehID=00&RouteID=DN47&Lat=22.5658745&Long=88.4107966667&
| | Time=2013-01-13T11:24:31"
| |
[No response from the server. Next update in 20 s.]
| |
+----->| Header: POST (T=NON, Code=0.02, MID=0x7d39)
| POST | Token: 0x54
| | Uri-Path: "vehicle-stat-00"
| | Content Type: text/plain
| | No-Response: 26
| | Payload:
| | "VehID=00&RouteID=DN47&Lat=22.5649015&Long=88.4103511667&
| | Time=2013-01-13T11:24:51"
Figure 2: Example of Unreliable Update with No-Response Option
Using POST as the Update Method
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4.1.2.2. POST Updating through Query String
It may be possible that the backend infrastructure deploys a
dedicated database to store the location updates. In such a case,
the client can update through a POST by sending a query string in the
URI. The query string contains the name/value pairs for each update.
No-Response can be used in the same manner as for updating fixed
resources. The scenario is depicted in Figure 3.
Client Server
| |
| |
+----->| Header: POST (T=NON, Code=0.02, MID=0x7d38)
| POST | Token: 0x53
| | Uri-Path: "updateOrInsertInfo"
| | Uri-Query: "VehID=00"
| | Uri-Query: "RouteID=DN47"
| | Uri-Query: "Lat=22.5658745"
| | Uri-Query: "Long=88.4107966667"
| | Uri-Query: "Time=2013-01-13T11:24:31"
| | No-Response: 26
| |
[No response from the server. Next update in 20 s.]
| |
+----->| Header: POST (T=NON, Code=0.02, MID=0x7d39)
| POST | Token: 0x54
| | Uri-Path: "updateOrInsertInfo"
| | Uri-Query: "VehID=00"
| | Uri-Query: "RouteID=DN47"
| | Uri-Query: "Lat=22.5649015"
| | Uri-Query: "Long=88.4103511667"
| | Uri-Query: "Time=2013-01-13T11:24:51"
| | No-Response: 26
| |
Figure 3: Example of Unreliable Update with No-Response Option
Using POST with a Query String to Insert Update Information
into the Backend Database
4.2. Multicasting Actuation Command from a Handheld Device to a Group
of Appliances
A handheld device (e.g., a smart phone) may be programmed to act as
an IP-enabled switch to remotely operate on one or more IP-enabled
appliances. For example, a multicast request to switch on/off all
the lights of a building can be sent. In this case, the IP switch
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RFC 7967 CoAP No-Response Option August 2016
application can use the No-Response option in a NON request message
to reduce the traffic generated due to simultaneous CoAP responses
from all the lights.
Thus, No-Response helps in reducing overall communication cost and
the probability of network congestion in this case.
4.2.1. Using Granular Response Suppression
The IP switch application may optionally use granular response
suppression such that the error responses are not suppressed. In
that case, the lights that could not execute the request would
respond back and be readily identified. Thus, explicit suppression
of option classes by the multicast client may be useful to debug the
network and the application.
5. IANA Considerations
The IANA had previously assigned number 284 to this option in the
"CoAP Option Numbers" registry. IANA has updated this as shown
below:
+--------+--------------+-------------+
| Number | Name | Reference |
+--------+--------------+-------------+
| 258 | No-Response | RFC 7967 |
+--------+--------------+-------------+
6. Security Considerations
The No-Response option defined in this document presents no security
considerations beyond those in Section 11 of the base CoAP
specification [RFC7252].
7. References
7.1. Normative References
[RFC2119] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119,
DOI 10.17487/RFC2119, March 1997,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc2119>.
[RFC7252] Shelby, Z., Hartke, K., and C. Bormann, "The Constrained
Application Protocol (CoAP)", RFC 7252,
DOI 10.17487/RFC7252, June 2014,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc7252>.
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RFC 7967 CoAP No-Response Option August 2016
7.2. Informative References
[CoAP-ADAPT]
Bandyopadhyay, S., Bhattacharyya, A., and A. Pal,
"Adapting protocol characteristics of CoAP using sensed
indication for vehicular analytics", 11th ACM Conference
on Embedded Networked Sensor Systems (SenSys '13),
DOI 10.1145/2517351.2517422, November 2013.
[CoAP-PUBSUB]
Koster, M., Keranen, A., and J. Jimenez, "Publish-
Subscribe Broker for the Constrained Application Protocol
(CoAP)", Work in Progress, draft-koster-core-coap-
pubsub-05, July 2016.
[CoAP-TCP-TLS]
Bormann, C., Lemay, S., Tschofenig, H., Hartke, K.,
Silverajan, B., and B. Raymor, Ed., "CoAP (Constrained
Application Protocol) over TCP, TLS, and WebSockets", Work
in Progress, draft-ietf-core-coap-tcp-tls-04, August 2016.
[HTTP-to-CoAP]
Castellani, A., Loreto, S., Rahman, A., Fossati, T., and
E. Dijk, "Guidelines for HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping
Implementations", Work in Progress, draft-ietf-core-http-
mapping-13, July 2016.
[ITS-LIGHT]
Bhattacharyya, A., Bandyopadhyay, S., and A. Pal,
"ITS-light: Adaptive lightweight scheme to resource
optimize intelligent transportation tracking system (ITS)
- Customizing CoAP for opportunistic optimization", 10th
International Conference on Mobile and Ubiquitous Systems:
Computing, Networking and Services (MobiQuitous 2013),
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-11569-6_58, December 2013.
[RFC5405] Eggert, L. and G. Fairhurst, "Unicast UDP Usage Guidelines
for Application Designers", BCP 145, RFC 5405,
DOI 10.17487/RFC5405, November 2008,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc5405>.
[RFC7390] Rahman, A., Ed., and E. Dijk, Ed., "Group Communication
for the Constrained Application Protocol (CoAP)", RFC
7390, DOI 10.17487/RFC7390, October 2014,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc7390>.
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RFC 7967 CoAP No-Response Option August 2016
[RFC7641] Hartke, K., "Observing Resources in the Constrained
Application Protocol (CoAP)", RFC 7641,
DOI 10.17487/RFC7641, September 2015,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc7641>.
Acknowledgments
Thanks to Carsten Bormann, Matthias Kovatsch, Esko Dijk, Bert
Greevenbosch, Akbar Rahman, and Klaus Hartke for their valuable
input.
Authors' Addresses
Abhijan Bhattacharyya
Tata Consultancy Services Ltd.
Kolkata, India
Email: abhijan.bhattacharyya@tcs.com
Soma Bandyopadhyay
Tata Consultancy Services Ltd.
Kolkata, India
Email: soma.bandyopadhyay@tcs.com
Arpan Pal
Tata Consultancy Services Ltd.
Kolkata, India
Email: arpan.pal@tcs.com
Tulika Bose
Tata Consultancy Services Ltd.
Kolkata, India
Email: tulika.bose@tcs.com
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