Internet DRAFT - draft-hallambaker-mesh-developer

draft-hallambaker-mesh-developer







Network Working Group                                 P. M. Hallam-Baker
Internet-Draft                                              28 June 2023
Intended status: Informational                                          
Expires: 30 December 2023


              Mathematical Mesh: Reference Implementation
                  draft-hallambaker-mesh-developer-11

Abstract

   The Mathematical Mesh 'The Mesh' is an end-to-end secure
   infrastructure that facilitates the exchange of configuration and
   credential data between multiple user devices.

   This document describes the Mesh reference code and how to install,
   run and make use of it in applications.  It does not form a part of
   the Mesh specifications and is not normative.

   This document is also available online at
   http://mathmesh.com/Documents/draft-hallambaker-mesh-developer.html.

Status of This Memo

   This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the
   provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.

   Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering
   Task Force (IETF).  Note that other groups may also distribute
   working documents as Internet-Drafts.  The list of current Internet-
   Drafts is at https://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 30 December 2023.

Copyright Notice

   Copyright (c) 2023 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
   document authors.  All rights reserved.








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   This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
   Provisions Relating to IETF Documents (https://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.

Table of Contents

   1.  Definitions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   2
     1.1.  Requirements Language . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3
     1.2.  Defined Terms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3
     1.3.  Related Specifications  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3
     1.4.  Implementation Status . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3
   2.  Getting the Reference Code and Build Tools  . . . . . . . . .   3
     2.1.  Obtaining the Development Environment . . . . . . . . . .   3
     2.2.  Obtaining the Build Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
     2.3.  Obtaining the Mesh Source Libraries . . . . . . . . . . .   4
   3.  Compiling the Reference Code  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
     3.1.  Creating a software signing key . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
     3.2.  Create (dummy) build action files . . . . . . . . . . . .   6
   4.  Running the Reference Code Examples . . . . . . . . . . . . .   6
     4.1.  Starting the Server . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   6
     4.2.  The Profile Manager Wizard  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
     4.3.  The Profile Connection Wizard . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
   5.  Platform specific configuration data  . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
     5.1.  Windows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
       5.1.1.  Private Key Data  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
       5.1.2.  Registry settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   8
       5.1.3.  Profile data files  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   8
     5.2.  OSX and Linux . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   8
   6.  Implementation Status . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   8
     6.1.  Reference Implementation  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   9
       6.1.1.  Coverage: . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   9
       6.1.2.  Licensing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  10
       6.1.3.  Implementation Experience . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  10
       6.1.4.  Contact Info  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  10
   7.  Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  10
   8.  IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  10
   9.  Acknowledgements  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  10
   10. Informative References  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  10

1.  Definitions

   This section presents the related specifications and standard, the
   terms that are used as terms of art within the documents and the
   terms used as requirements language.





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1.1.  Requirements Language

   This document is not normative and does not contain requirements
   language

1.2.  Defined Terms

   The terms of art used in this document are described in the _Mesh
   Architecture Guide_ [draft-hallambaker-mesh-architecture].

1.3.  Related Specifications

   The architecture of the Mathematical Mesh is described in the _Mesh
   Architecture Guide_ [draft-hallambaker-mesh-architecture].  The Mesh
   documentation set and related specifications are described in this
   document.

1.4.  Implementation Status

   The implementation status of the reference code base is described in
   the companion document [draft-hallambaker-mesh-developer].

2.  Getting the Reference Code and Build Tools

   The Mesh Reference library was developed using Visual Studio 2017
   Community Edition [VS2017] using PHB's Build Tools [PHB2017]
   extensions.  The reference code itself is currently limited to C#
   libraries.

   The code should in theory run under other operating systems but this
   has not been tested recently.

   Development under different development environments is also possible
   but would require re-engineering to make use of the line mode
   versions of the build tools.

2.1.  Obtaining the Development Environment

   Visual Studio 2017 Community Edition is currently available at no
   cost for a wide range of non-commercial development including
   personal use and development of Open Source software.  For full
   details, please consult the license published by Microsoft.

   https://www.visualstudio.com/







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2.2.  Obtaining the Build Tools

   Over half the code in the reference code library is generated using
   code generators.  These are used to ensure that the specification,
   examples and reference code are always kept in synchronization.

   The build tools are published under an MIT License and are available
   in two forms:

   As stand-alone tools to be run from the command line.

   As a VSIX package that integrates into the Visual Studio environment.

   The source distribution is configured to use the tools integrated
   into the Visual Studio environment.  If development on other
   platforms is desired, the simplest approach is likely to be to write
   a tool that reads the Visual Studio configuration files and generates
   the corresponding files for use with make.

   The VSIX package is available from the Visual Studio extensions
   gallery:

   PHB Code Generation Tools

   The source code for the build tools is available from:

   https://sourceforge.net/projects/phb-build-tools/

2.3.  Obtaining the Mesh Source Libraries

   The Mesh reference library source code is published under an MIT
   license and is available from:

   https://sourceforge.net/projects/mathematicalmesh/

3.  Compiling the Reference Code

   To compile the code it is necessary to

   Create a signing key

   Create batch files for pre and post build tasks

3.1.  Creating a software signing key

   The purpose of signing assemblies is so that they can be
   authenticated during the load process.  For this to be secure, it is
   of course essential that each developer has their own key.



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   To create a software developer signing key, the Visual Studio 'sn'
   tool is used.  To run the tool, start the Visual Studio Developer
   Console _in administrator mode_. This requires the following steps:

   Move to a directory you want to write to.

   Set the machine to create user based keys

   Create a new key and write it to a file.

   Copy the file from the key to a container.

   Delete the container.

   Locate the private key file

   Give permission to use the key.

   This is of course one of the tasks we would like to automate with the
   Mesh tools in due course but that presents a bootstrap problem.

   C:\Windows\System32>cd hallam

   c:\Users\hallam>sn -m N

   Microsoft (R) .NET Framework Strong Name Utility  Version 4.0.30319.0
   Copyright (c) Microsoft Corporation.  All rights reserved.

   Key containers are user based

   c:\Users\hallam>sn -k fred.snk

   Microsoft (R) .NET Framework Strong Name Utility  Version 4.0.30319.0
   Copyright (c) Microsoft Corporation.  All rights reserved.

   Key pair written to fred.snk

   c:\Users\hallam>sn -i fred.snk SigningKeyDeveloper

   Microsoft (R) .NET Framework Strong Name Utility  Version 4.0.30319.0
   Copyright (c) Microsoft Corporation.  All rights reserved.

   Key pair installed into 'SigningKeyDeveloper'

   c:\Users\hallam>del fred.snk

   c:\Users\hallam>




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3.2.  Create (dummy) build action files

   Visual Studio allows projects to specify batch files to be run before
   and after a project build.  Since the actions to be taken are likely
   to change from developer to developer, these are specified in
   separate batch files.  All that is necessary to build the code
   without warnings is to specify a set of dummy batch files with the
   following names and place them somewhere in the command line $PATH
   environment variable.

   The files required are:

   VSPreBuild.bat

   VSPostBuild.bat

   VSPostBuildWindows.bat

   VSPostBuildOSX.bat

   VSPostBuildLinux.bat

   The following code will prevent error messages being thrown:

   @echo off
   SETLOCAL
   exit /b 0

4.  Running the Reference Code Examples

   The reference code examples are designed to illustrate how the Mesh
   might be used in an application rather than be standalone tools in
   their own right.  The Mesh is designed to make it each for developers
   to add security to their own applications rather than providing the
   applications themselves.

4.1.  Starting the Server

   On the Windows platform, the server runs in the context of the
   platform Web server and must be granted permission to bind to the
   range of server addresses used using the netsh command.

   From a command prompt with administrator privileges, run the
   following command:

   netsh http add urlacl http://<domain>/.well-known/mmm/
       \user=<machine>\<user>




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   Where <domain> is the DNS domain name under which the service is run,
   <machine> is the Windows domain name of the machine and <user> the
   account name.

   To start the service from the command line type:

   servermesh <domain>

   The server does not require administration privileges.

4.2.  The Profile Manager Wizard

   The profile manager wizard demonstrates functions that are performed
   on an administration device.  These include creating a completely new
   profile and initial configuration of applications, connecting a
   device to the profile and recovery of the profile from escrow data.

   To run the client from the command line, place the executable image
   in a location that it will be found in the PATH variable and type:

   meshclient

4.3.  The Profile Connection Wizard

   The Profile connection wizard demonstrates the much more restricted
   functionality that would be required in a Mesh connected application
   and/or a profile manager for a non-administration device.

   To run the client from the command line, place the executable image
   in a location that it will be found in the PATH variable and type:

   meshconnect

5.  Platform specific configuration data

5.1.  Windows

5.1.1.  Private Key Data

   All private key data is stored using the Windows public key store.
   At minimum, this ensures that private keys are obfuscated and
   encrypted under the account password to protect the data against
   casual extraction attacks.  On a machine with cryptographic hardware
   support such as a TPM or HSM, extraction of the private key may be
   infeasible without physical access to the machine and possibly
   require sophisticated diagnostic equipment.





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5.1.2.  Registry settings

   Separate settings are used for production and test code.  Test Code
   should use the Registry Hive:

   HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\CryptoMesh

   Production code should use the hive

   HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\MathematicalMesh

   In either case the sub structure is:

   Accounts  Contains the set of Mesh Portal Accounts for the user.  The
      default value is the account name of the default account.  The
      Name of the each key is a portal account name and the value a
      REG_SZ entry containing the UDF of the profile master key.

   PersonalProfiles  Contains the set of Mesh Profiles for the user.
      The default value is the UDF of the default profile master key.
      The Name of each key is the UDF of the master key and the value a
      REG_SZ entry containing the file location of the cached copy of
      the personal profile.

   ThisDevice  Contains the set of Device profiles in the same format as
      the PersonalProfiles.

5.1.3.  Profile data files

   The profile data itself is stored in data files at the location
   specified in the registry.  The files are standard XML files in UTF8
   encoding.

5.2.  OSX and Linux

   All the code is regularly compiled for Linux and macOS.  The unit
   tests are not run regularly however.

6.  Implementation Status

   This section records the status of known implementations of the
   protocol defined by this specification at the time of posting of this
   Internet-Draft, and is based on a proposal described in [RFC6892].
   The description of implementations in this section is intended to
   assist the IETF in its decision processes in progressing drafts to
   RFCs.  Please note that the listing of any individual implementation
   here does not imply endorsement by the IETF.  Furthermore, no effort
   has been spent to verify the information presented here that was



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   supplied by IETF contributors.  This is not intended as, and must not
   be construed to be, a catalog of available implementations or their
   features.  Readers are advised to note that other implementations may
   exist.

   According to [RFC6892], "this will allow reviewers and working groups
   to assign due consideration to documents that have the benefit of
   running code, which may serve as evidence of valuable experimentation
   and feedback that have made the implemented protocols more mature.
   It is up to the individual working groups to use this information as
   they see fit".

6.1.  Reference Implementation

   Implementer: Phillip Hallam-Baker

   Maturity: Experimental Prototype

   This implementation was used to produce the reference section and all
   the examples in this document.  Since the conversion of specification
   to code is automatic, there is a high degree of assurance that the
   reference implementation is consistent with this document.

6.1.1.  Coverage:

   The draft-xx branch describes the code used to create version xx of
   this document.

   The main current limitations are that the code only supports RSA key
   pairs and for ease of development the server does not persist keys
   across sessions.  Nor does the implementation currently support the
   HTTP payload authentication and encryption layer or make use of TLS.
   These could be easily fixed.

   The client and server are implemented as libraries that may be called
   from a multi-protocol server.  A standalone server will be provided
   in a future release.

   Only the JSON encoding is currently implemented.  The JSON-B, JSON-C,
   ASN.1 and TLS Schema implementations are all supported by the code
   generation tool but not currently implemented as the build tool
   bindings for those encodings have not yet been finalized or
   documented.

   The key restrictions for TLS key exchange have not yet been
   implemented.





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   The code has only been tested on Windows 10 but passed compatibility
   testing for both Mono and dotNetCore 2.0 run times which should in
   theory permit use on Linux and OSX platforms.

6.1.2.  Licensing

   The code is released under an MIT License

   Source code is available from GitHub at
   https://github.com/hallambaker/Mathematical-Mesh

6.1.3.  Implementation Experience

   The implementation and specification documentation were developed in
   Visual Studio using the PHB Build Tools suite.

6.1.4.  Contact Info

   Contact Phillip Hallam-Baker phill@hallambaker.com

7.  Security Considerations

   Security Considerations are addressed in the companion document
   [draft-hallambaker-mesh-architecture]

8.  IANA Considerations

   This document specifies no actions for IANA

9.  Acknowledgements

   Comodo Group: Egemen Tas, Melhi Abdulhayo?lu, Rob Stradling, Robin
   Alden.

10.  Informative References

   [draft-hallambaker-mesh-architecture]
              Hallam-Baker, P., "Mathematical Mesh 3.0 Part I:
              Architecture Guide", Work in Progress, Internet-Draft,
              draft-hallambaker-mesh-architecture-21, 23 October 2022,
              <https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/draft-hallambaker-
              mesh-architecture-21>.









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   [draft-hallambaker-mesh-developer]
              Hallam-Baker, P., "Mathematical Mesh: Reference
              Implementation", Work in Progress, Internet-Draft, draft-
              hallambaker-mesh-developer-10, 27 July 2020,
              <https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/draft-hallambaker-
              mesh-developer-10>.

   [PHB2017]  "[Reference Not Found!]".

   [RFC6892]  Wilde, E., "The 'describes' Link Relation Type", RFC 6892,
              DOI 10.17487/RFC6892, March 2013,
              <https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc6892>.

   [VS2017]   "[Reference Not Found!]".





































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