IETF Next Steps in Signaling S. Lee, Ed.
Internet-Draft Samsung AIT
Expires: August 21, 2005 S. Jeong
HUFS
H. Tschofenig
Siemens AG
X. Fu
Univ. of Goettingen
J. Manner
Univ. of Helsinki
February 20, 2005
Applicability Statement of NSIS Protocols in Mobile Environments
draft-ietf-nsis-applicability-mobility-signaling-01.txt
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Abstract
The mobility of an IP-based node affects routing paths, and as a
result, can have a significant effect on the protocol operation and
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state management. This draft discusses the effects mobility can
cause to the NSIS protocols, and how the protocols operate in
different scenarios, and together with mobility management protocols.
Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
2. Requirements Notation and Terminology . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
3. Problem Statement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
3.1 General problems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
3.2 Mobility-Related Issues with NSIS Protocols . . . . . . . 9
3.2.1 NTLP-Specific Problems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
3.2.2 QoS-NSLP-Specific Problems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
3.2.3 NAT/FW NSLP-Specific Problems . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
3.2.4 Common problems related to both NTLP and NSLP . . . . 11
4. Basic Operations for Mobility Support . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
4.1 Route changes caused by mobility . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
4.2 CRN discovery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
4.2.1 Possible approaches for CRN discovery . . . . . . . . 15
4.2.2 The identifiers for CRN discovery . . . . . . . . . . 16
4.2.3 The procedures of CRN discovery . . . . . . . . . . . 17
4.3 Path update . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
4.3.1 State setup and update . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
4.3.2 State teardown . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
5. Applicability Statement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
5.1 Support for macro mobility-based scenarios . . . . . . . . 22
5.1.1 Implications to Mobile IP-related scenarios . . . . . 22
5.1.1.1 Mobile IPv4-specific issues . . . . . . . . . . . 24
5.1.1.2 Mobile IPv6-specific issues . . . . . . . . . . . 26
5.2 Multihoming scenarios . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
5.2.1 Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
5.2.2 Examples of NTLP/NSLP support for mobility . . . . . . 28
5.3 QoS performance considerations in mobility scenarios . . . 29
5.4 Support for Ping-Pong type handover . . . . . . . . . . . 31
5.5 Peer failure scenarios . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
6. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
6.1 MN as data sender . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
6.1.1 MN is authorizing entity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
6.1.2 CN is authorizing entity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
6.1.2.1 CN asks MN to trigger action (on behalf of the
CN) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
6.1.2.2 CN uses installed state to route message
backwards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
6.1.2.3 MN and CN are authorized . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
6.1.3 CN as data sender . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
6.1.3.1 CN is authorizing entity . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
6.1.3.2 MN is authorizing entity . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
6.1.4 Multi-homing Scenarios . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
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6.1.4.1 MN as data sender . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
6.1.4.2 CN as data sender . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
6.1.5 Proxy Scenario . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
6.1.6 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
7. Change History . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
8. References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
8.1 Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
8.2 Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Authors' Addresses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Acknowledgement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
A. Generic Route Changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Intellectual Property and Copyright Statements . . . . . . . . 49
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1. Introduction
The mobility of IP-based nodes incurs route changes, usually at the
edge of the network. Route changes may also be caused by reasons
other than mobility, such as routing protocol adaptation in response
to varying network conditions (load sharing, load balancing, etc), or
host multi-homing. Normal IP mobility (i.e., macro-mobility) also
involves the change of mobile node IP addresses. Since IP addresses
are usually part of flow identifiers, the change of IP addresses
implies the change of flow identifiers. Local mobility usually does
not cause the change of the global IP addresses, but affects the
routing paths within the local access network.
The goals of this draft are to present the effects of mobility on the
NSIS Transport Layer Protocol (NTLP) and on the NSIS Signaling Layer
Protocols (NSLP). The NTLP is an application independent protocol to
transport service-related information between nodes in a network, and
each specific service has its own NSLP protocol. This draft also
discusses how the NSIS protocols should work in various mobility
scenarios.
This draft mainly discusses the operations of the NSIS protocols in
very basic mobility scenarios (e.g., macro-mobility management
protocols such as Mobile IPv4 and Mobile IPv6), including support for
multi-homing. More complex scenarios and issues on interworking with
various mobility-related protocols, such as Seamoby and local
mobility management protocols, are left for future work.
2. Requirements Notation and Terminology
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
"SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this
document are to be interpreted as described in [1].
The terminology in this draft is based on [2] and [3]. In addition,
the following terms are used.
(1) Downstream
The direction from a data sender towards the destination.
(2) Upstream
The direction from a data destination towards the sender.
(3) Crossover Node (CRN)
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A Crossover Node is a node that for a given function is a merging
point of two or more separate sets of state information. The CRN
may not necessarily be a physical route splitting point. There
can be different types of logical (but not necessarily physical)
CRNs according to the signaling states, flow directions, mobility
management types, and generic routing (not caused by mobility):
From the perspective of NSIS states (i.e., NSLP and NTLP
states), the types of CRN are basically classified as follows.
NSLP CRN, from the NSLP's point of view, is a signaling
application-aware node in the network where the
corresponding signaling flows begin to merge or split after
route changes or mobility. The NSLP CRN may be different
according to the types of NSLP.
NTLP CRN, from the NTLP's point of view, is a network node
where more than one NTLP states begin to merge or split
after route changes or mobility.
NSIS CRN is an NTLP CRN and/or an NSLP CRN. Note that
although the types of CRN differ according to the state
information, the CRN required for QoS-NSLP operation is the
NSLP CRN which has the corresponding signaling application
information for the path update.
There are some differences between route changes and mobility
in forming the CRN according to the direction of signaling
flows followed by data flows
In the mobility scenarios, there are two different types of
merging point in the network according to the direction of
signaling flows followed by data flows as shown in Figure 2
of Section 4.1, where we assume that the MN is a data
sender.
Upstream CRN (UCRN), after a handover, is the node
closest to the data sender from which the state
information towards the data sender begins to diverge.
Downstream CRN (DCRN), after a handover, is the node
closest to the data sender from which the state
information towards the data receiver begins to converge.
In this case, the DCRN and the UCRN may be different due
to the asymmetric characteristics of routing although the
CN is the same.
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In the route changes, the path change of signaling flows
results in forming a chain of two CRNs regardless of the
direction of signaling flows followed by data flows as shown
in Figure 14 of Appendix, which is referred to as a
divergence-convergence pair:
Upstream CRN, after a route changes, is the node at which
the state information towards the data sender begins to
diverge, or to converge. As a result, a
(divergent-convergent) UCRN pair will be formed.
Downstream CRN, after a route changes, is the node at
which the state information towards the data receiver
begins to diverge, or to converge. As a result, a
(divergent-convergent) DCRN pair will be formed.
From the mobility management point of view, mobility CRN is the
node where the old and new paths (physically) merge. Note that
in general, the mobility CRN may be different from the NSLP CRN
or NTLP CRN.
Routing CRN is the node where the old and new paths (rather
physically) merge using normal routing. Depending on the
location of nodes, the routing CRN may not be equal to the NSLP
CRN or NTLP CRN.
(4) Path Update and Local Repair
Path Update is the procedure for the re-establishment of NSIS
state on the new path, the teardown of NSIS state on the old path,
and the update of NSIS state on the common path due to the
mobility. This is used to improve mobility handling for the
affected flows.
Upstream Path Update: Path Update for the upstream signaling
flow which is initiated by an upstream signaling initiator. If
the MN is a data sender, the Path Update is initiated by an NI
on the common path (e.g., a CN, an HA, or an MAP).
Downstream Path Update: Path Update for the downstream
signaling flow which is triggered by a downstream signaling
initiator. If the MN is a data sender, the Path Update is
triggered by an NI on the new path (e.g., an MN, a mobility
agent, or an AR).
In case of route changes, the update of NSIS state on the common
path is not required due to no change of flow identifiers, which
makes the NSIS signaling the localized. Especially, in mobility
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scenarios, if the NSIS signaling interacts with localized mobility
management protocols (e.g., HMIPv6), the Path Update can be
localized within the access network.
(5) Dead Peer Discovery (DPD)
The procedure for finding a dead NSIS peer due to a link/node
failure or due to an MN moving away.
3. Problem Statement
IP mobility in its simplest form only includes route changes. The
various protocols that seek to support the mobility of end hosts may
use some techniques to reach their goals. This section identifies
problems caused by mobility, which may have a significant impact on
the operations of NSIS protocols.
3.1 General problems
The general problems caused by mobility are as follows.
(1) Change of route and possibly change of the MN IP address
Topology changes entail the change of routes for data packets sent
to or from the MN and may lead to the change of host IP addresses.
(2) Latency of route changes
The change of route and IP addresses in mobile environments is
typically much faster and more frequent than traditional route
changes, for example, those due to failure, adding or removal of
nodes/links.
(3) Explicit routes
Signaling protocols usually expect the data traffic to follow the
same path as the signaling traffic, but the data traffic sometimes
traverses the path different from the path of signaling traffic
due to the adaptation of routing protocol according to varying
network conditions such as load balancing, load sharing and
mobility. For example, Mobile IP adds the possibility to use the
routing headers to define explicit routes, which diverts the
traffic from an expected path, too.
(4) IP-in-IP encapsulation
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Mobility protocols may use IP-in-IP encapsulation on the segment
of the end-to-end path for routing traffic from the CN to the MN,
and vice versa. Encapsulation harms any attempt to identify and
filter. Moreover, encapsulation may lead to changes in the
routing paths, since the sender and destination IP addresses
differ from the values in the original user data packet. The same
considerations apply if the signaling packets are encapsulated,
too.
(5) Ping-pong type handover
Signaling protocols should remove states quickly along the old
path to mitigate the waste of resources. However, in a ping-pong
type handover, the MN returns to the previous AR after staying
with the new AR only for a short while, so the prompt removal of
state along the old path causes the state to be re-established
soon again, and therefore it adds overhead.
(6) Upstream Path Update vs. Downstream Path Update
Since the upstream and downstream paths may not be equal, the
upstream and downstream CRNs may not be equal, either. Therefore,
the Path Update needs to be handled independently for upstream and
downstream flows, including the discovery of upstream and
downstream CRNs.
(7) State identification problem
A mobility event may cause the address of flow endpoints to
change, and thus it is desirable that the signaling application
state is independent of the underlying flows to keep the state
from being re-installed completely. Therefore, the session and
flow identifiers need to be created independently, and this makes
it possible to correlate the session identifier with the signaling
application which may generate different flows.
(8) Double reservation problem
Since the state on the old path (and the common path) still
remains as it is after re-establishing the state along the new
path due to mobility (or route changes), the double reservation
problem occurs. Although the state on the old and common paths
can be torn down by the timeout of soft state, the refresh timer
value may be quite long (e.g., 30s as a default value in RSVP).
This problem results in the waste of resources and call blocking.
(9) End-to-end signaling problem
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The mobility may change the flow identifier, and the change of
flow identifier requires state update along the entire path to
reflect the physical location of the MN, resulting in the
end-to-end signaling. This also incurs a long state setup delay
and increased signaling overhead, which affects overall
performance of signaling protocols. The long state setup delay
may ultimately give rise to the service blackout or degradation of
multimedia services in mobile environments.
(10) Identification of the crossover node
When a handover at the edge of network has happened, in the
typical case, only a part of the end-to-end path used by the data
packets changes. In this situation, the CRN plays a central role
in managing the establishment of the new signaling application
state, and removing any useless state.
(11) Key exchange
When a handover happens, nodes on the new path must be able to
verify the signaling messages of the MN, and vice versa. For
example, if signaling messages are encrypted on a hop-by-hop
basis, the new access router should be able to continue the
message encryption and decryption with the incoming MN.
(12) AA Issues
The Path Update procedure may be initiated by the MN, the CN, or
even nodes within the network (e.g., MAP/GPA in HMIP). This Path
Update on behalf of the MN raises authentication and authorization
issues.
3.2 Mobility-Related Issues with NSIS Protocols
Considering the issues identified in Section 3.1, this section mainly
discusses the concerns that arise for the NSIS protocols.
3.2.1 NTLP-Specific Problems
(1) Interfaces between Mobile IP and NSIS protocols
To continue to support the existing NSIS state for a session, the
NTLP protocol should be immediately involved in the CRN discovery
and Path Update after a mobility event (e.g., handover) happens.
In this situation, is it necessary to define a Mobile IP-specific
API in NSIS? Should a common triggering mechanism between routing
and NSIS processes be defined to monitor the operations of other
mobility protocols and trigger a relevant event accordingly?
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(2) Localized Path Update
NSIS protocols need to make the Path Update localized to enhance
and performance parameters such as signaling setup delay, resource
utilization, and in this case, a few issues on the interaction
between the micro-mobility management protocols and NTLP protocols
arise. For example, when interacting with HMIP, how is the Path
Update performed with scoped signaling messages within the access
network under the control of MAP?
3.2.2 QoS-NSLP-Specific Problems
(1) Invalid NR problem
If the old AR is the last node on the old signaling path due to
the MNíŻs handover, its QoS-NSLP may trigger an error message to
indicate that QoS-NSLP messages cannot be forwarded any further.
This error message may mistakenly cause the removal of the state
on the obsolete path, which is called the íŤinvalid NR problemíŻ
[12].
(2) Priority of signaling messages
Some messages of QoS-NSLP need to be used to check the
availability of resources in a new access network to ensure that
the moving MN gets the required QoS. for example, the Query
message can be used for that purpose. In this case, should a high
priority be given to the signaling message to expedite the
process?
(3) Optimal refresh timer value for mobile environments
In the situation where handover occurs frequently, the maintenance
of signaling state on the old path for a long time is not
necessary. The QoS-NSLP needs to choose appropriate refresh
intervals depending on the network environment (e.g., access
network, or core network).
(4) Athorization-related issues with teardown
When tearing down the obsolete state after CRN discovery, can
the teardown message be sent toward the opposite direction to
the state initiating node? This leads to an
authorization problem because a node which does not initiate
signaling for establishing the QoS-NSLP state may delete the
state.
(5) Peering agreement issue
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In the inter-domain handover scenarios, how is the peering
agreement established for aggregate reservation and authorization
to support individual sessions?
(6) Dead peer discovery
A dead peer can occur either because a link or a network node
failed, or because the MN moved away without informing QoS-NSLP
(it is recommended to link mobility and NSIS signaling such that
this does not happen). How can dead peers be detected in a fast
and efficient manner?
3.2.3 NAT/FW NSLP-Specific Problems
The NAT/FW-NSLP establishes and maintains firewall pinholes and NAT
bindings at NAT/FW-NSLP nodes along the data path [6]. With regard
to mobility, a few issues need to be considered:
(1) Update of firewall rules and NAT bindings
When an IP address changes, firewall rules and/or NAT bindings
become invalid, which effectively prevents the end host from
sending or receiving data packets. For example, without updating
the firewall pinhole by an NSIS-aware data sender (located behind
a firewall), data packets with a new source IP address are most
likely dropped at the firewall. If a data receiver (located
behind a NAT) changes its IP address, incoming packets are
rewritten at the NAT and forwarded to the wrong IP address. In
this case, the QoS-NSLP might 'only' temporarily experience a
weaker QoS if the installed flow identifier is not up-to-date.
(2) Re-use of NAT/FW-NSLP's old state
Although NSIS states can be released by applying the soft-state
principle, mobility can leave states (such as firewall pinholes)
in place for some time. Since the NAT/FW-NSLP aims to install
pinholes (and NAT bindings), it is possible to re-use this
installed state once a mobile node roams to a new location.
Deleting state along the old path helps to limit this problem.
However, this problem exists anyway due to the capability of IP
spoofing as identified in [7], and the main problem is the usage
of non-cryptography-based IP address filters. Therefore, the
teardown of the NAT/FW-NSLP state in mobility scenarios needs to
be considered in the fashion different from that of QoS-NSLP
state.
3.2.4 Common problems related to both NTLP and NSLP
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(1) CRN discovery-related issues
Which layer should be responsible for the CRN discovery, NTLP
(GIMPS) or NSLP (QoS-NSLP)? Although the QoS-NSLP can detect the
change of signaling path and discover the CRN by keeping track of
SII, the CRN discovery at the NTLP layer may be preferred to at
the QoS-NSLP. However, is there any advantage if NSLP discovers
the CRN?
(2) CRN discovery and Path Update on the IP-tunneling path
Considering interworking with IP-tunneling, NTLP needs to consider
how to perform CRN discovery and Path Update on the IP-tunneling
path. For example, whether the GIMPS peer discovery can be used
for the CRN discovery on the tunnel should be discussed further.
Additionally, after route optimization, when to remove the
tunneling segment on the signaling path and/or how to tear down
the state via interworking with the IP-tunneling operation should
also be discussed.
(3) Issues on API between NTLP and NSLP
In mobile environments, mobility-related information for Path
Update can be exchanged through the API specified in [2]. Based
on the information, the involved NSLP can initiate Path Update by
sending necessary signaling messages through the API. However,
what information should be sent from GIMPS to an NSLP to inform of
the route changes needs to be discussed further. The details on
the API can be an implementation issue.
(4) Multihoming-related issues
A host that is an initiator or responder of signaling messages may
be multi-homed in mobile environments. NSIS signaling protocols
should use such multi-homed interfaces to perform load-balancing
and load-sharing, or to support seamless mobility. However, which
NxLP functionality is required in various multihoming scenarios
(e.g., load balancing, bi-casting, etc.) is an open question. An
overall coordination for interworking between the NSIS protocol
and multihoming capability needs to be discussed further.
4. Basic Operations for Mobility Support
In this section, we mainly discuss the basic operations of NSIS
signaling protocols needed after route changes caused by mobility.
The basic operations include how to discover an appropriate CRN and
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how to perform the Path Update according to the direction of data
flows. The procedures for CRN discovery (explained in Section 4.2.3)
can be applied in the same way for both the generic route changes and
mobility. However, the Path Update for mobility is different from
that for the generic route changes as address in Section 2.
4.1 Route changes caused by mobility
The route change caused by mobility occurs due to the change of the
network attachment point. It causes divergence (or convergence)
between the old path where the NSIS state has already been installed
and the new path where data forwarding will actually happen.
Although the mobility may be considered similar to the generic route
changes, the main difference is that the Message Routing Information
(MRI: e.g., flow identifier) may not change after the route changes
while the mobility may cause the change of MRI by having a new
network attachment point. Since the session should remain the same
after any mobility event, the MRI should not be used to identify the
session of any signaling application [4].
The route change brings on the change of signaling topology, and this
causes differences between the types of route changes (e.g., the
generic route changes or mobility) (see Appendix). The mobility
generally creates a common path, an old path, and a new path, and the
old and new paths converge or diverge depending on the direction of
each signaling flow as shown in Figure 1.
Old path
+--+ +-----+
original |MN|------> |OAR | ----------V
| | |NSLP1|
address +--+ +-----+ V common path
| K +-----+ +-----+ +--+
| | |---|NSLP1|--->|CN|
| |NSLP2| |NSLP2| | |
v New path +-----+ +-----+ +--+
+--+ +-----+ ^ M N
New CoA |MN|------> |NAR |-----------^ >>>>>>>>>>>>
| | |NSLP1| ^
+--+ +-----+ ^
L ^
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>^
(Binding process)
====(downstream signaling followed by data flows) ======>
(a) The topology for downstream NSIS signaling flow due to
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mobility
Old path
+--+ +-----+
original |MN|<------ |OAR | ---------^
address | | |NSLP1| ^
+--+ +-----+ ^ common path
| C +-----+ +-----+ +--+
| | |<---|NSLP1|---|CN|
| |NSLP2| |NSLP2| | |
v New path +-----+ +-----+ +--+
+--+ +-----+ V B A
New CoA |MN|<------ |NAR |----------V >>>>>>>>>>>>
| | |NSLP1| ^
+--+ +-----+ ^
D ^
^
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>^
(Binding process)
<=====(upstream signaling followed by data flows) =====
(b) The topology for upstream NSIS signaling flow due to
mobility
Figure 1. The topology for NSIS signaling caused by mobility.
These topological changes caused by mobility make the NSIS state
established on the old path useless and therefore it should be
removed (in the end). In addition, the existing NSIS state should
also be re-established along the new path and to be updated along the
common path.
NSIS signaling should be localized when route changes (including
mobility) occur to minimize the impact on the seamless service and to
improve signaling scalability, This localized signaling procedure is
referred to as Path Update (see the Terminology section). In mobile
environments, the NSLP/NTLP needs to limit the scope of signaling
information only to the affected section of the signaling path
because the path in the wireless access network usually changes only
partially.
One of the most appropriate nodes to perform the Path Update is the
CRN where the old and new session paths meet logically. Therefore,
the CRN discovery can be a crucial element to alleviate the double
reservation and end-to-end signaling problems identified in Section
3.1.
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The NTLP (of a node experiencing a topological change) should detect
the route change through the various mechanisms described in [4] at
the transport level and trigger the necessary operation of the
relevant NSLP. For example, the NSLP should initiate NSIS state
re-establishment (i.e., QoS re-establishment) along the new path and
the update or removal of the existing state at the signaling
application level.
4.2 CRN discovery
4.2.1 Possible approaches for CRN discovery
The approaches for CRN discovery can be divided into two classes
according as which layer is responsible for the CRN discovery
(addressed in Section 3.2.2), and whether the discovery is coupled
with the transport of signaling application messages.
From the NSIS protocol stack point of view, the CRN can be discovered
at either NTLP or NSLP layer. For the CRN discovery at the NSLP
layer, the information contained in NSLP signaling messages sent from
the NSIS initiator (NI) can be used. For example, the NSLP of an
NSIS node can determine whether the node is a CRN by comparing the
Source Identification Information (SII) contained in the incoming
signaling message to the one stored previously in the node.
It is also possible to discover the CRN at the NTLP layer since NTLP
is responsible for detecting the path change of data (or signaling)
flow (the route changes may easily be detected at the NTLP level
rather than at the NSLP). The CRN discovery can be considered as an
extension to the peer discovery at the NTLP level (e.g., using GIMPS
query-response [2]). In general, the GIMPS message has message
routing state information such as flow/session/signaling application
identifiers, so the signaling application can be identified at the
NTLP level. In the connection mode of NTLP, when NTLP establishes a
messaging association between two adjacent peers, two NTLP peers
exchange message routing state information through GIMPS query and
response messages. Therefore, although the CRN can be discovered at
the NTLP level, the discovered CRN could be actually an NSLP-aware
node which has an involved signaling application.
There can also be two different approaches for the CRN discovery
according as whether the discovery is coupled with signaling message
or not: coupled approach and uncoupled approach. In the coupled
approach, the signaling to install the NSIS state along the new path
or update the state along the common path is performed simultaneously
with the CRN discovery. In the uncoupled approach, the signaling for
the Path Update is performed after the CRN discovery is completed.
These two approaches may have some effect on security aspect.
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Generally, the coupled approach would be preferred to the uncoupled
approach to reduce the delay for signaling setup. Note that the CRN
discovery and Path Update described in this draft are based on the
coupled approach.
4.2.2 The identifiers for CRN discovery
There are some basic identifiers which can be used for the CRN
discovery at the NTLP level: session identifier (SID), flow
identifier (MRI), and signaling application identifier (NSLP_ID)
related to message routing state [2], and NSLP branch identifier
(NSLP_Br_ID) which identifies an NSIS signaling branch.
The SID in the GIMPS message is used to easily identify the involved
session because it remains the same while the MRI may (or may not)
change due to handover. The MRI is used to specify the relationship
between the address information and the state (e.g., QoS-NSLP state)
re-establishment. In other words, the change of MRI indicates a
topological change to the CRN and therefore it represents that the
state along the common path should be updated.
The NSLP_ID is used to refer to the corresponding NSLP at the GIMPS
level, and it helps to discover an appropriate NSLP CRN using the
GIMPS peer discovery message.
As a virtual branch identifier, the NSLP_Br_ID can be used to
establish or delete NSIS associations between NSIS peers. It can
also be used as an identifier to determine the CRN at the GIMPS
layer. The NSLP_Br_ID may include the location information of NSIS
peer nodes with the corresponding NSLP ID obtained by the procedure
of GIMPS message association. For instance, as shown in Figure 2,
for the downstream case, NSLP1 of node A requires a messaging
association for sending its messages towards node D after a route
changes. In this case, NSIS entity A creates an NSLP_Br_ID for NSLP
1 toward node D and increases the counter of NSLP_Br_ID to locally
distinguish each virtual interface identifier between adjacent NSLP
peers: the corresponding NSLP_Br_ID is 1-D-#2; 1, D, and #2 indicate
an NSLP_ID-flow, a flow direction (Downstream or Upstream), and a
value of the branch counter, respectively. Note that the NSLP_Br_ID
can be included in the NSIS message, but it can also be considered as
an implementation issue. This identifier would be more useful when
the physical merging point of the old path and the new path is not an
NSLP CRN as shown in Figure 2 (a).
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+------------------+-------+-------+--------+------------+-------+
| Message Routing |Session| NSLP |Upstream| Downstream | NSLP |
| Information | ID | ID | Peer | Peer |Br. ID |
+------------------+-------+-------+--------+------------+-------+
| Method = Path | 0xABCD| NSLP1 | | Pointer to | 1-D-#1|
|Coupled; Flow ID =| | | | A-C | |
| {IP-#X, IP-#V, | | | | Pointer to | 1-D-#2|
| protocol, ports} | | | | A-D | |
| | | | Z | | 1-U-#1|
| Method = Path | | | | | |
|Coupled; Flow ID =| 0x1234| NSLP2 | | B | 2-D-#1|
| {IP-#X, IP-#V, | | | | | |
| protocol, ports} | | | Z | | 2-U-#1|
+------------------+-------+-------+--------+------------+-------+
(a) Routing state table at node A (NSLP CRN)
+------------------+-------+-------+----------+----------+-------+
| Message Routing |Session| NSLP |Upstream |Downstream| NSLP |
| Information | ID | ID | Peer | Peer |Br. ID |
+------------------+-------+-------+----------+----------+-------+
| Method = Path | 0xABCD| NSLP1 |Pointer to| | 1-U-#1|
|Coupled; Flow ID =| | | K-N | | |
| {IP-#X, IP-#V, | | |Pointer to| | 1-U-#2|
| protocol, ports} | | | L-N | | |
| | | | | O | 1-D-#1|
| Method = Path | | | | | |
|Coupled; Flow ID =| 0x1234| NSLP2 | | Pointer | 2-D-#1|
| {IP-#X, IP-#V, | | | | to N-R | |
| protocol, ports} | | | M | | 2-U-#1|
+------------------+-------+-------+----------+----------+-------+
(b) Routing state table at node N (NSLP CRN)
Figure 2. Routing state table and NSLP branch ID
Optionally, the Mobility identifier as an object form can also be
used to inform of the handover of an MN or a route change [12] and
therefore to expedite the CRN discovery. For example, the
mobility_event_counter (MEC) field in the mobility object can be used
to detect the latest handover event to avoid any confusion about
where to send the confirmation message. Therefore, the Mobility
identifier is useful to discover the most appropriate CRN.
4.2.3 The procedures of CRN discovery
When a mobility event occurs, the CRN can be recognized by comparing
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the previously stored identifiers with the identifiers included in
the incoming NSIS peer discovery message initiated by an NI (e.g., an
MN or a CN). For example, if an NTLP message is routed to an NSIS
peer node, the following information (shown in Figure 2 (a) and (b))
should be checked to determine if the current node is CRN:
- Whether the same NSLP_ID exists
- Whether the corresponding CRN has already been discovered
- Whether the same SID and MRI exist
- Whether the NSLP_Br_ID has been changed: for example, as shown in
Figure 3 (a), for NSLP 1 it has been changed to 1-D-#2 from
1-D-#1.
- Optionally, the Mobility identifier can be examined, if any. For
example, the MEC field of the Mobility object can be used to find
out which message has been sent due to the latest handover.
The CRN discovery can be further divided into the UCRN discovery and
DCRN discovery according as which node is a signaling initiator (by
upstream or downstream), or whether the MN is a data sender:
- If the MN is a data sender and undergoes a handover, the MN begins
to transmit signaling messages toward a CN in the downstream
direction. If an NSLP-aware node recognizes that the session
paths logically converge at that node, and then the node
determines that it is the DCRN; the procedure for CRN discovery
corresponds to the creation of the routing table of node N as
shown in Figure 2 (b).
- When an MN (as a sender) undergoes handover, the UCRN can be
discovered for the upstream flow. The UCRN should be the node
(closest to the MN) where the signaling flow begins to logically
diverge: it corresponds to the creation of the routing table of
node A as shown in Figure 2 (a). Since the UCRN is determined
according as whether the outgoing path diverges or not, the UCRN
discovery is more complex than the DCRN discovery.
4.3 Path update
The CRN discovery procedures are different depending on the direction
of signaling flows in mobility scenarios, and therefore the
procedures for Path Update also are different according to the
direction of signaling flow. The Path Update can be divided into
upstream Path Update and downstream Path Update. For both types of
Path Update, the NSIS protocol may need to interact with various
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mobility signaling protocols, if any (during or posterior handover)
to obtain performance gains (e.g., through fast re-establishment of
the NSIS state on the new path). For this purpose, NSIS may also
need to monitor the movement of the MN through several methods [4].
In this section, we assume that an MN is a data sender.
4.3.1 State setup and update
Before initiating the Path Update, the MN or CN needs to have its
session ownership by the procedures for authentication and
authorization and to check the availability of resources on the new
path. In case of QoS-NSLP, the Query message can be used to find the
availability of resources in the new access network. It may be
desirable to provide the Query message with a higher priority than
other signaling messages. If the resources along the new path are
not sufficient, it may be needed to keep the state established
previously using multihomed interfaces while blocking incoming new
requests (see Section 6.2). In this situation, providing NSIS
signaling for the Path Update with a high priority over local
requests for the resources will be helpful for seamless service.
In the downstream Path Update, if resources are available, the MN
initiates the NSIS signaling for state re-setup toward a CN along the
new path, and the DCRN discovery is implicitly performed by this type
of signaling as described in Section 4.2.3. When the DCRN is
discovered, it sends a response message toward the MN to notify of
the NSLP state installed (e.g., QoS-NSLP state) or installs the NSLP
state as a response to the initiated NSLP signaling (e.g., as in
RSVP). In case of QoS-NSLP, the sender-initiated approach leads to
faster setup than the receiver-initiated approach as in RSVP as shown
in Figure 3. And then, the DCRN sends a refresh message toward the
signaling destination to update the changed MRI on the common path
and also sends a teardown message toward the old AR to delete the
NSIS state (if possible).
In the case of upstream Path Update, the CN (or a HA/ a GFA/MAP)
sends a refresh message toward the MN to perform Path Update. UCRN
is discovered implicitly by the CN-initiated signaling along the
common path as described in Section 4.2.3. In this case, the CN
should be informed of the mobility event using an NSIS signaling
message sent by the MN or monitoring the mobility signaling procedure
(e.g., detecting a change in its binding entry (see Section 6.1)).
After the UCRN is determined, it may send a refresh message to the MN
along the new path while establishing the NSIS association between
the newly found peers. Afterward, the UCRN may send a teardown
message toward the old AR to delete the NSIS state (if possible).
The state update on the common path to reflect the changed MRI brings
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issues on the end-to-end signaling addressed in Section 3.1.
Although the state update does not give rise to re-processing of AAA
and admission control, it may lead to the increased signaling
overhead and latency.
One of the goals of the Path Update is to avoid the double
reservation (in QoS signaling) on the common path as described in
Section 3.1. The double reservation problem can be solved by
establishing a signaling association using a unique SID and by
updating packet classifier/flow identifier. In this case, the NSLP
state should be shared for flows with different flow identifiers.
NI (MN) NF NF NR (CN)
| RESERVE | | |
+--------->| RESERVE | |
| +--------->| RESERVE |
| | +--------->|
| | | |
| | | RESPONSE |
| | RESPONSE |<---------+
| RESPONSE |<---------+ |
|<---------+ | |
| | | |
(a) Sender Initiated Reservation
NI (MN) NF NF NR (CN)
| QUERY | | |
+--------->| QUERY | |
| +--------->| QUERY |
| | +--------->|
| | | |
| | | RESERVE |
| | RESERVE |<---------+
| RESERVE |<---------+ |
|<---------+ | |
| | | |
| RESPONSE | | |
+--------->| RESPONSE | |
| +--------->| RESPONSE |
| | +--------->|
(b) Receiver Initiated Reservation
Figure 3. Sender- vs. Receiver-initiated reservation
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4.3.2 State teardown
After re-establishment of the NSIS state along the new path, the
state on the obsolete path needs to be quickly removed by the Path
Update mechanism to prevent the waste of resources due to double
reservation (and resource allocation problem by call blocking) and to
reduce the cost of using resources in the access network as
identified in Section 3.1. Although the release of the existing
state on the old path can be accomplished by the timeout of soft
state, the refresh timer value may be quite long and the maintenance
of the NSIS state on the old path is not necessary. Therefore, the
transmission of a teardown message is useful to quickly delete the
old state. Note that, however, it is not necessary for the GIMPS to
be explicitly removed because of the inexpensiveness of the state
maintenance at the GIMPS layer [2].
The CRN is an appropriate point to initiate the teardown toward the
old AR after re-establishment of the state along the new path. The
release of the state on the obsolete path can be accomplished by
comparing the NSLP_Br_IDs and through reverse routing using SII.
This can prevent the teardown message from being forwarded toward
along the common path.
It may not desirable to allow the teardown message to be sent toward
the opposite direction to the state initiating node. This is because
it leads to an authorization problem because a node which does not
initiate signaling for establishing the NSIS state can delete the
already established state. One simple way to avoid the authorization
problem is to disallow the transmission of the teardown message in
the reverse direction.
The immediate removal of state along the old path may not be always
appropriate for some mobility situations addressed in Section 3. For
instance, in the ping-pong type of fast handover, it increases
signaling overhead, and thus when to delete the state along the
obsolete path needs to be discussed further (see Section 5.4).
Another example is the íŤinvalid NRíŻ problem. If the old AR is the
last node on the signaling path due to handover, its NSLP may trigger
an error message to indicate that NSLP messages cannot be forwarded
any further. This error message can immediately remove the state on
the old path, which should not be deleted before re-establishing the
state along the new path (make-before-break handover). The more
details are discussed further in Section 5.5.
5. Applicability Statement
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5.1 Support for macro mobility-based scenarios
This section considers how NSIS protocols should interact with the
basic macro-mobility protocols such as Mobile IPv4 and Mobile IPv6.
Basically, the following scenarios need to be considered.
(1) A flow associated with an MN, either sent or received by the MN,
desires to continually get signaling services even after a Mobile
IP handover. In this case, NSIS needs to be able to signal for
such flows upon the MN's movement to provide seamless service
(e.g., seamless QoS). The signaling procedures will create a new
NSIS branch in the changed direction of flow through the CRN
discovery and Path Update.
(2) Either the sender or the receiver of a flow can initialize NSIS
signaling, and a node within the network may also initiate NSIS
signaling for the given session to handle route changes caused by
Mobile IP-based routing, or to support seamless handover if
necessary. In this case, it is essential to require the NI to be
authorized to initialize NSIS signaling.
(3) Data traffic, in either direction between an MN and a CN, can be
routed directly using a routing header, or indirectly by IP-in-IP
encapsulation (or a combination of both approaches) on different
segments of the data path depending on the operation of the
mobility protocol (e.g., Mobile IPv4, Mobile IPv6, LMM, reverse
tunneling, etc.) In this case, NSIS signaling needs to immediately
be initiated via a mobility routing interface (e.g., mobility API)
between the NSIS protocol and the Mobile IP.
(4) An MN undergoes either intra-domain (within an access network
domain) handover or inter-domain (from an access network domain to
another) handover. In case of the inter-domain handover, topology
information exchange, authorization and accounting issues may be
more complicated. In such various handover scenarios, the
interaction between NSIS signaling and some mobility management
protocols (e.g., HMIP, FMIP, etc..) may give rise to significant
performance gains (see Section 5.3).
(5) With Mobile IPv6, an MN can support multiple CoAs at a time, if
it is connected to multiple access networks simultaneously (even
if it is connected to one access network). Although only one
primary CoA will be used for routing traffic from the CN to the
MN, this multi-homing feature potentially can be used to enhance
the NSIS signaling performance (see Section 5.2).
5.1.1 Implications to Mobile IP-related scenarios
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As NSIS is path-coupled signaling, one imposed requirement here is
that the NSIS protocols are to be associated with route changes to
support route optimization between the CN & the MN, and the IP-in-IP
encapsulation from the HA to the MN. This interaction needs to be
notified to all NSLPs (by the API between GIMPS and NSLP) for the CRN
discovery and the Path Update. Therefore, NTLP or NSLP needs to have
an interface with the Mobile IP to react to the mobility event. In
other words, an NSIS implementation needs to be developed to react
based on the endpoint notification regarding which behaviour of a
mobility protocol has taken place (e.g., the timer of Mobile IP
expires).
An ideal interface between the NSIS signaling and the Mobile IP
should make it possible for NSIS signaling to immediately react to
the mobility event whenever Mobile IP changes its related
characteristics in any place for the flows. In general, it is
appropriate that NTLP is involved in the interaction with the Mobile
IP rather than NSLP because NTLP is responsible for detecting the
mobility and routing NSIS messages. Therefore, it is reasonable to
assume NTLP should be able to notify NSLP for the necessity of state
update when the mobility is detected.
Here are also some issues which arise concerning the API between the
NSIS protocol and the Mobile IP.
- Which information should be used to detect the movement? After an
MN moves to a new network attachment point, the new reachability
information is transferred from the MN to its HA as the last
procedure of handover. It indicates that the NTLP may need to
interact with a binding process (e.g., a registration request in
Mobile IPv4 and Binding Update in Mobile IPv6) to detect the IP
address change and refer to the tunneling-related information.
Provided that the NTLP detects the mobility using the information
regarding binding process, faster state establishment and removal
can be performed. However, in the fast or ping-pong type
handover, it may result in significant signaling overhead and some
possible errors (see Section 5.4).
- How and what information can the NSLP expect from NTLP, or
directly from the routing interface after a mobility event
happens?
- How is the mobility binding update interval coordinated with the
NSIS signaling interval? Since the binding update or the
registration request occurs periodically even for the MN with the
same point of attachment, the movement detection based on the
binding process may cause the NTLP/NSLP to initiate the CRN
discovery and the Path Update inappropriately. To avoid the
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problem, the change of CoA should be checked carefully. Although
this issue is closely related to implementation, it should be
considered to obtain any performance gains in signaling.
An overall coordination/synchronization for the interworking between
the NSIS and the Mobile IP needs to be discussed further.
5.1.1.1 Mobile IPv4-specific issues
With Mobile IPv4, the data flows are forwarded based on the
triangular routing, and an MN retains a new CoA from the FA (or an
external method such as DHCP) in the visited access network [5].
When the MN acts as a sender, the downstream data flows sent from the
MN are directly transferred to the CN not necessarily through the HA
or indirectly through the HA using the reverse routing. On the other
hand, upstream data flows sent from the CN are routed through the IP
tunneling between the HA and the FA (or the HA and the MN in case of
the Co-located CoA). With this approach, routing is dependent on the
HA, and therefore the NSIS protocols needs to interact with the IP
tunneling procedure of Mobile IP for signaling.
The Figures 5 (a) to (e) show the NSIS signaling flows depending on
the direction of data flows and the routing methods .
MN FA (or FL) CN
| | |
| IPv4-based Standard IP routing |
|------------ |------------------------------>|
| | |
(a) MIPv4: MN-->CN, no reverse tunnel
MN FA HA CN
| IPv4 (normal) | | |
|--------------->| IPv4(tunnel) | |
| |--------------->| IPv4 (normal) |
| | |-------------->|
(b) MIPv4: MN-->CN, the reverse tunnel with FA CoA
MN (FL) HA CN
| | | |
| IPv4(tunnel) | |
|------------------------------->|IPv4 (normal) |
| | |-------------->|
(c) MIPv4: MN-->CN, the reverse tunnel with Co-located CoA
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CN HA FA MN
|IPv4 (normal) | | |
|-------------->| | |
| | MIPv4 (tunnel) | |
| |---------------->| IPv4 (normal)|
| | |------------->|
(d) MIPv4: CN-->MN, Foreign agent Care-of-address
CN HA (FL) MN
|IPv4(normal ) | | |
|-------------->| | |
| | MIPv4 (tunnel) | |
| |------------------------------->|
| | | |
(e) MIPv4: CN-->MN with Co-located Care-of-address
Figure 5. Implications for signaling under different Mobile IPv4
scenarios
When an MN (as a sender) arrives at a new FA and the corresponding
binding process for the FA CoA is completed,
- For the downstream signaling flow, the MN needs to perform the CRN
discovery (DCRN) and the (downstream) Path Update toward the CN
(as described in Section 4) to establish the NSIS state along the
new path between the MN and the CN as shown in Figure 4 (a). If
the reverse tunnel is used and the state along the tunneling path
does not exist, the NSIS state should be established along the
tunneling path from the FA to the HA as shown in Figure 4 (b). In
this case, a DCRN may be discovered on the tunneling path and the
new flow identifier for the state update on the tunnel may need to
be created.
- For the upstream signaling flow, the CN may initiate the NSIS
signaling to update the existing state between the CN and the HA,
and in this case NSIS signaling should interact with the IP
tunneling operation to update the state along the tunneling
segment from the HA to the FA as shown in Figure 4 (d). During
this operation, a UCRN may be discovered on the tunneling path,
and the new flow identifier for the state update on the tunnel may
need to be created.
When the MN (as a sender) arrives at a new foreign link and the
corresponding binding process for the co-located CoA is completed,
- For the downstream signaling flow, the NSIS signaling for the DCRN
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discovery and the Path Update is the same as the case for FA CoA
above except for the use of the reverse tunnel path from the MN to
the HA as shown in Figure 4 (C).
- For the upstream signaling flow, the NSIS signaling for the UCRN
discovery and the Path Update is also the same as the case for FA
CoA above except for the end point of tunneling path from the HA
to the MN as shown in Figure 4 (e).
Note that the DCRN and UCRN may be identified at the same node on the
tunneling path. For example, NSIS CRN may be usually the HA if the
HA and the FA are NSIS-aware and the NSIS state along the tunneling
path is not established. Therefore, the CRN discovery will be
affected depending on the type of interaction between NSIS signaling
and IP tunneling. The FA and the HA should be NSIS-aware to do the
Path Update along the appropriate path. The effect that the IP
tunneling has on the CRN discovery and the Path Update should be
discussed further.
5.1.1.2 Mobile IPv6-specific issues
Unlike Mobile IPv4, with Mobile IPv6, the FA is not required in the
data path and the route optimization process between the MN and CN
can be used to avoid the triangular routing in the Mobile IPv4
scenario as shown in Figure 5 [9]. If the use of route optimization
is not mandatory, data flow routing and NSIS signaling procedures
(including the CRN discovery and the Path Update) will be similar to
the case of using the Mobile IPv4 with co-located CoA described in
Section 5.1.1.1.
When an MN (as a sender) arrives at a new AR and the binding process
is successfully completed,
- For the downstream signaling flow, the MN may initiate NSIS
signaling for the DCRN discovery and the (downstream) Path Update
to establish the state along the new path between the MN and the
CN or the tunneling path from the MN to the HA if the reverse
tunnel is used, as shown in Figures 5 (a) and (b), respectively.
- For the upstream signaling flow, the CN may also update the state
along the common path toward the HA through the Path Update, and
afterward the NSIS state along the tunneling segment from the HA
to the MN may be updated via the interaction with IP tunneling
operation as shown in Figure 5 (d). However, if the route
optimization is used between the CN and the MN, for the upstream
flow, CN needs to newly initiate NSIS signaling to discover an
appropriate UCRN and do the Path Update along a new path between
the CN and the MN as shown in Figure 5 (c): the bidirectional
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state establishment may be required. In this case, the obsolete
path of the existing tunneling segments needs to be removed after
re-establishment of NSIS state along the optimized path. When to
remove the tunneling segment and/or how to tear it down through
the interworking with the IP-tunneling operation is still an open
issue.
Although the routing based on Mobile IPv4 with the co-located CoA is
similar to the case of Mobile IPv6, one of the differences is the
method to acquire the CoA. The Mobile IPv6 is able to acquire the
CoA from the corresponding access router or external method through
the stateless autoconfiguration or the stateful autoconfiguration
(e.g., DHCPv6), respectively while the Mobile IPv4 obtains the CoA
through from FA or using an external method such as DHCP. This
difference may have some effects on the creation of flow identifier
and make NSIS signaling performed differently. It is still an open
issue and needs to be discussed further in the later version of this
draft.
MN CN
| |
|IPv6+HomeAdressOpt |
|--------------------------------------------->|
| |
(a) MIPv6: MN-->CN, no reverse tunnel
MN HA CN
|IPv6(tunnel) | |
|------------->| IPv6(normal) |
| |------------------------------>|
| |
(b) MIPv6: MN-->CN, with reverse tunnel
CN MN
| |
| MIPv6(RH Type 2) |
|--------------------------------------------->|
| |
(c) MIPv6: CN-->MN, route optimization
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CN HA MN
|IPv6(normal) | |
|------------->| |
| | MIPv6(tunnel) |
| |------------------------------>|
(d) MIPv6: CN-->MN, no route optimization
Figure 6. Implications for signaling under different Mobile IPv6
scenarios
5.2 Multihoming scenarios
5.2.1 Overview
A host that is an initiator or responder of signaling messages may be
not only mobile but also multi-homed. When considering current
activities in the Multi6 and HIP WGs, multi-homed hosts and scenarios
may be common in the future IPv6-based Internet. Such scenarios may
include load balancing where multiple connections to different
providers are used simultaneously. In this case, the multi-homed MN
may use different paths that converge at some CRN. If load balancing
is active, the paths are used at the same time, but if multi-homing
is used for resilience only, the active path changes during
fail-over.
The term "seamless mobility" is often referred to mean that the MN is
able to keep an ongoing session seamlessly (without experiencing
perceivable service interruption or performance penalty) during and
after moving from one access network to another. Measures to achieve
seamless mobility include soft handover and anticipated handover.
The former requires the MN to keep the old path, while data is
received over the new path. This approach is possible if the MN is
multi-homed.
Other possible scenarios may include bi-casting, bandwidth increase,
etc.
5.2.2 Examples of NTLP/NSLP support for mobility
The NTLP uses an endpoint address (e.g., CoA) to install message
routing state. In multi-homed MN scenarios, there are multiple CoAs
for the MN, and therefore an appropriate CoA should be selected to
establish the NSIS state between the MN and the CN.
If the multi-homed MN has multiple network interfaces, each network
interface may use a unique CoA. To find a feasible signaling path,
multiple NSIS messages (e.g., multiple QUERY messages of the
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QoS-NSLP) can be sent from the MN to the HA or CN (in case of route
optimization), the HA or CN may decide which one to choose based on
some criteria (e.g., resource availability, delay, etc.). According
to the decision, the HA or CN should send a signaling message (e.g.,
RESERVE) to the MN with the selected CoA for further action.
In the situation where the new CoA introduced in Mobile causes the
change of message routing state, both new and old addresses are valid
during a certain period of time, and the new data path may co-exist
with the old one. It is theoretically possible to perform an NSIS
state update on the new path during this period, however the
signaling endpoints need to be careful, so that the correct routing
information will be delivered for setting up a new message routing
state or updating the existing message routing state on the correct
path segment. In addition, performing such actions should not cause
any NSLP service interruption, protocol misbehaviors, or security
holes.
When there is a need for inter-domain handover, an additional delay
may be caused to perform authentication and authorization compared to
the intra-domain handover, but the latency penalty of NSIS signaling
can be mitigated if the MN is multi-homed.
For load balancing purposes, NSIS may need to install the NSIS state
along multiple paths. In this case, multiple NSIS messages (e.g.,
multiple QUERY messages in case of QoS-NSLP) can be sent to the
remote endpoint to establish NSIS state. In this way, multiple paths
can be set up for load balancing between the same endpoints.
A more detailed analysis of the NTLP/NSLP functionality in different
multi-homed scenarios (e.g., including load balancing, bi-casting,
etc.) will be presented in the later version of this draft.
5.3 QoS performance considerations in mobility scenarios
The routing characteristics of Mobile IP described in Section 5.1
cause the session path to be changed and the exiting protocols which
do not support NSIS signaling in dynamic environment may cause the
problems addressed in Section 3.1. In particular, QoS performance in
terms of resources utilization and signaling latency needs to be
examined so that how NSIS protocols should interact with mobility
protocols is correctly analyzed. From the perspective of resource
utilization, the double reservation problem can be alleviated by the
CRN discovery and the Path Update. However, how to manage the
resource utilization in NSIS signaling should be taken into account;
in this regard, the adjustment of refresh interval should be
considered as addressed in Section 3.2.
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The NSIS protocol suite normally uses a soft-state approach based on
the peer-to-peer refresh to manage state in NEs. At the GIMPS layer,
the state is maintained through the exchange of GIMPS query/ response
messages between adjacent peers [2]. The peer relationship is
maintained using a timer which indicates how long the association
between the peers can be considered valid. In other words, if the
timer has not been refreshed until it expires (e.g., in 30 seconds as
a default value), the peer relationship is removed. The management
of state (i.e., routing state and messaging association) can be
controlled in this way.
In case of QoS-NSLP, states are set up and maintained using the
peer-to-peer refresh messages. The peer-to-peer based refresh allows
the QoS-NSLP to appropriately select the refresh interval by
considering the current network environment. For example, the
refresh timer value is set to a smaller value in the mobile/wireless
(access) network than that in the core (wired) network as in [7].
Especially, in the situation where handover happens very frequently,
the adjustment of the refresh interval reduces the waste of
resources. However, unlike the QoS-NSLP, the refresh timer of NTLP
state does not need to be adjusted in the network since resource
reservation is not involve directly. Furthermore, the NTLP state
along the obsolete path does not need to be explicitly removed before
the expiration of refresh timer.
In mobile wireless networks, the QoS-NSLP (rather than the NTLP) is
able to set the refresh timer value depending on the handover type
(e.g., make-before-break or break-before-make) or the reservation
style (e.g., pre-establishment or re-establishment) to optimize the
resources utilization. For example, in the make-before-break
handover, an appropriate refresh time interval can be notified using
the reserved field of REFRESH object [8]. If the refresh timer value
is set to a little higher value than the estimated handover latency,
the MN can be provided with seamless QoS service using the
pre-reserved resources without the waste of resources.
After the state setup on the new path, QNEs on the signaling path may
send a refresh message to the neighboring peer node before the
refresh timer expires to update only the state previously installed
along the path, or update the changed flow ID along the common path .
The overhead required to perform refresh can be reduced, in a way
similar to the refresh reduction in RSVP [9]. Once a RESPONSE
message which indicates the successful installation of a reservation
has been received, subsequent RESERVE messages for refresh can simply
refer to the existing reservation, rather than including the complete
reservation specification. For example, in case of QoS-NSLP, only
the SID and the SII with no QSPEC are sent to just refresh the state
(e.g., reservation) previously installed. The changed flow ID
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together with those IDs is only sent to update it along the common
path. Especially, transmission of the reduced number of refresh
messages over wireless channels, access networks, or core networks
results in the efficient utilization of resources.
As mentioned in Section 3.1, unlike the generic route changes, in
mobility scenarios, the end-to-end signaling problem by the Path
Update gives rise to the degradation of network performance such as
increased signaling overhead, service blackout, and so on. To reduce
signaling latency in the Mobile IP-based scenarios, the NSIS protocol
suite needs to interwork with localized mobility management (LMM).
If the GIMPS/NSLP( QoS-NSLP or NAT/FW-NSLP) protocols interacts with
Hierarchical Mobile IPv6 and the CRN is discovered between an MN and
MAP, the Path Update can be localized. However, how the Path Update
is performed with scoped signaling messages within the access network
under the MAP is for further study.
In the inter-domain handover, a possible way to mitigate the latency
penalty is to use the multi-homed MN. It is also possible to allow
the NSIS protocols to interact with mobility protocols such as
Seamoby protocols (e.g., CARD and CTP) and FMIP. Another scenario is
to use peering agreement which allows aggregation authorization to be
performed for aggregate reservation on an inter-domain link without
authorizing each individual session. How these approaches can be
used in NSIS signaling is for further study.
5.4 Support for Ping-Pong type handover
NSIS signaling needs to consider the interaction with ping-pong type
handover as addressed in Section 3.1 because it has a significant
effect on when to initiate signaling for state setup or for state
release. With the sender-initiated approach, if an MN (as a sender)
undergoes a handover to a new AR, the NTLP interacts with the binding
process of Mobile IP to initiate state setup. However, if the MN
moves to other ARs or the previous AR again in a short while,
signaling using the interaction with the binding process may result
in considerable signaling overhead and some possible errors.
Immediate teardown of state on the old path may also bring on the
similar result. Some identifiers defined in [5][6] may be useful for
this situation.
An NE (e.g., QNE) can determine if it is a merging point (i.e., an
NSLP CRN) of the old and new paths, an involved state setup on the
new path and state teardown on the old path. However, if the QNE
receives an NSIS message (e.g., RESERVE) with a special flag (e.g.,
NO_REPLACE flag) set but with the different SII, state teardown on
the old path should not happen. This may apply to a ping-pong type
handover where the MN wishes to keep state to its old attachment
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point in case it moves back there.
The Reservation Sequence Number (RSN) may be useful in detecting
duplicate messages in the mobile environment. For example, it is
possible for the MN to move to the second NAR soon after being
attached to the 1st NAR. The CRN may receive the RESERVE messages
(with different RSN) twice when the RESERVE message from the 1st NAR
arrives later than the RESERVE message from the 2nd NAR. In this
case, the CRN should determine which ESERVE message is the latest one
via the RSN.
The Mobility object described in Section 4.2.2 can be defined in the
NTLP (e.g., in GIMPS payload) or NSLP messages to notify of any
mobility event explicitly, and it may contain various
mobility-related fields, e.g., mobility_event_counter (MEC). The MEC
field can inform the CRN of which incoming massage is the latest and
so it is useful to detect the latest handover event for avoiding any
confusion about where to send a confirmation message and to handle
the ping-pong type of movement.
5.5 Peer failure scenarios
A dead peer can occur either because a link or a network node failed,
or because the MN moved away without informing NSLP/NTLP (it is
recommended to link mobility- and NSIS signaling such that this does
not happen).
Dead peers of interest in mobility scenarios include CRN, MN, and AR.
In general, it is possible that only NSIS functions (i.e., NTLP/NSLP)
of the node may fail, or the physical hardware. In this regard, the
following issues arise.
- An MN may either fail or move. When it fails, it becomes a dead
peer. If it moves and changes its IP address without notifying
NSLP/NTLP, it also becomes a dead peer. The failure or movement
of an MN may cause the 'invalid NR' problem [8] where the NR is
the MN addressed in Section 3.2. If the MN moves, care should be
taken to prevent the teardown of NSIS state on the old path before
the NSIS state is re-established on the new path. In this case,
an error message should not be generated/sent to avoid any
teardown on the old path. The problem can be solved by using
hanover_init (HI) field of the Mobility object described in
Section 5.4. The HI field can explicitly inform AR that a
handover is now initiated, and thus the invalid NR problem can be
resolved [12]. It may be possible that the MN is not the NR, but
a router in the access network (possibly the AR) is proxying for
the MN instead.
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- The failure of a (potential) NSIS CRN may result in incomplete
state re-establishment on the new path and incomplete teardown on
the old path after handover. In this case, a new CRN should be
discovered immediately by the CRN discovery procedure described in
Section 4.2.3.
- The failure of an AR may make the interactions with Seamoby
protocols (such as CARD and CT) impossible. In this case, the
neighboring peer closest to the dead AR may need to interact with
such protocols. A more detailed analysis of interactions with
Seamoby protocols is left for future work.
In any case, dead peers should be discovered fast to minimize service
interruption. The procedures for dead peer discovery (DPD) should be
the same no matter why a peer is dead, because an NE discovering a
dead peer cannot judge the specific reason. The procedures for DPD
should be handled by the NTLP. In fact, the DPD can be considered as
an extension to the GIMPS peer discovery. A peer discovery message
can be periodically transmitted to the neighboring peer (e.g.,
responding node in [2]), and the responding node can send a response
message. To determine if the peer is alive, the use of a timer may
be helpful. For example, the response message may need to be
received by the sender (e.g., querying node in [2]) before the timer
expires. Otherwise, the responding node can be considered dead.
6. Security Considerations
This section describes authorization issues for mobility scenarios in
NSIS. It tries to raise additional questions beyond those discussed
in [7].
For the discussion of various authorization problems we assume that
initial authorization is strongly coupled to authorization handling
in subsequent message interactions. Making this assumption has some
implication to the signaling message behavior. It is certainly
possible that the entities who request the initial reservation or a
firewall pinhole and those who subsequently cause modifications are
not the same entities.
NSIS NSLPs define a flexible authorization scheme. As argued in [8]
it is necessary to consider cases where the sender, the receiver or
both are authorizing a reservation. For NAT and Firewall signaling
it is necessary that, the sender and the receiver, authorize the
creation of a NAT binding and the creation of a firewall pinhole.
Subsequently, we will consider the case where the mobile node acts as
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a data sender followed by a discussion of the CN as a data sender.
6.1 MN as data sender
This section refers to Figure 1 where the MN acts as a data sender
which moves from one point of attachment to another.
This description starts with an initial flow setup triggered by the
MN which is also authorized by the MN.
6.1.1 MN is authorizing entity
This scenario considers the initial flow setup executed by the MN
whereby the MN provides authorization for the initial flow setup.
The initial setup might be used to create state for subsequent
authorization actions by the MN. It is obvious that the
authorization for the NSLP application (e.g., QoS NSLP) has to be
provided. Depending on the underlying authorization model it might
be either peer-to-peer or end-to-middle. This authorization decision
can possibly be treated independent of the authorization issues
discussed in this section.
The following questions seem to be interesting:
- Should the MN indicate that it is the authorizing entity for
subsequent actions to all entities along the path?
- What information should be used for this purpose?
- Who should add this information? Should the visited network of the
MN add something to the signaling message during the initial flow
setup?
- How do other entities along the path learn this information?
MN CN
------>----->------>------>------>------>------> +
ACTION (MN is authz) |
|
<-----<-----<------<------<------<------<------- | Flow
ACK | Setup
|
|
===============================================> +
Traffic
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Figure 6: MN authorized initial reservation
Next, the case for a mobile node authorizing the DCRN is considered.
This communication is illustrated in Figure 7.
The movement of the mobile node after the initial flow setup requires
authorization. Various session ownership authorization issues are
illustrated in [7].
MN DCRN CN
+ E.g.
------>----->------>------>------>------>------> | Movement
ACTION | with state
| creation at
<-----<-----<------<------<------<------<------- + new path
ACK
Figure 7: MN authorizes DCRN
The following questions are of interest:
- Why should the DCRN execute something on behalf of the MN? (i.e.,
why should it trust the MN and what information can the DCRN use
for verification?) As an example, the DCRN might delete state
along the old segment.
- Should the DCRN alone be able to start signaling (the DCRN might
be a designed node in some mobility protocols (e.g., MAP)) since
it is the node which has more information than other nodes based
on the mobility signaling protocols?
- How should other nodes between the MN and the DCRN and the nodes
between the DCRN and the CN know that the DCRN is now acting on
behalf of the MN?
The case of a corresponding node triggering an action is discussed in
the paragraph below. Figure 8 shows the exchange graphically.
In this scenario the CN wants to, for example, tear-down a
reservation.
MN DCRN CN
<~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ +
TRIGGER | E.g.
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| Tear
| Down
------>----->------>------>------>------>------> |
ACTION |
|
<-----<-----<------<------<------<------<------- +
ACK
Figure 8: CN triggers action
The following questions arise:
- Why should the MN trust the trigger?
- Is it possible to specify the security properties of the trigger
message in more detail? Is this an NSIS signaling message?
- The discussions about an indicator which entity to charge for the
reservation might be relevant (see [8]).
- Should the CN restrict the actions of the MN (e.g., delete,
update, create)? On the shared segment it might, for example, be
possible to restrict the allowed action to a flow identifier
update.
6.1.2 CN is authorizing entity
This scenario is similar to the CN triggering in Section 6.1.1. Two
slightly different protocol variations will be considered.
Authorizing some actions in the reverse data flow direction is more
difficult as it can easily be seen in Figure 9.
6.1.2.1 CN asks MN to trigger action (on behalf of the CN)
In Figure 9 the CN authorizes the MN to start signaling after, for
example, a movement. After receiving the trigger message (and some
authorization information) the mobile node starts signaling along the
new segment and automatically discovers the DCRN. The message
travels along the shared segment to the CN and updates the flow
identifier (if necessary). The MN might additionally allow the DCRN
to delete the reservation along the old segment.
MN DCRN CN
<~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ +
TRIGGER |
|
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------>----->------>------>------>------>------> |
ACTION (CN is authz; MN on behalf of CN) |
+-----------------+ +-----------------+ |
| Action: | | Action: | |
| 'create' along)| | 'update' along)| |
| new segment) | | shared segment)| | Action
+-----------------+ +-----------------+ |
<------<------<------- |
+-----------------+ |
| Action: | |
| 'delete' along)| |
| old segment) | |
+-----------------+ |
<-----<-----<------<------<------<------<------- |
ACK |
|
|
===============================================> |
Traffic +
Figure 9: CN asks MN to trigger an action (on behalf of the CN)
The following questions need to be considered:
- How should the "delegation" mechanism work such that intermediate
nodes believe the MN that it is acting on behalf of the CN?
- Is it possible to carry this information with the trigger message
from the CN and the MN?
6.1.2.2 CN uses installed state to route message backwards
As a second variant the CN uses NSIS installed state to route a
signaling message backwards along the path. In some rare cases the
DCRN node might be known already. In this case it is possible to
stop the update process along the shared segment and to possibly mark
installed state along the old segment for deletion. When the MN
receives the message it again has to install state along the new
segment towards the DCRN. The mobile node might also trigger the
deletion of resources along the old segment together with this state
creation (pessimistic delete). An optimistic delete operation is
certainly more error prone.
MN DCNR CN
[ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~> ] +
[ TRIGGER (e.g., MIP) ] |
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|
------<-----<------<------<------<------<------< |
ACTION (CN is authz) |
+--------------------+ +-----------------+ |
| Action:optimistic | | Action: | |
| 'delete' along | | 'update' along)| |
| old segment) | | shared segment)| |
+--------------------+ +-----------------+ |
>------>------>----------->------>------>------- |
+-----------------+ ACK |
| Action: | | Action
| 'create' along)| |
| new segment) | |
+-----------------+ |
<------<------<------- |
+-------------------+ |
| Action:pessimistic| |
| 'delete' along) | |
| old segment) | |
+-------------------+ |
|
===============================================> |
Traffic +
Figure 10: CN uses installed state to route message backwards
Figure 10 raises a few questions:
The security properties of the trigger message need to be
evaluated.
It is not always possible to route signaling message backwards
from the CN to the MN:
- state at the new path might not be established (hence the
signaling message cannot travel backwards)
- the signaling message might not reach the MN via the old
segment.
In the multi-homing case where the mobile node can be reached via
more than one path it is possible to execute this exchange. The
same might be true for some local repair cases.
The messages triggered by the MN (namely create state along the
new segment and the pessimistic 'delete along the old segment)
still need to be executed on behalf of the CN. Compared to the
first variant there might be some room for optimization since the
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first message was transmitted by the CN.
6.1.2.3 MN and CN are authorized
If we argue that the authorization at the NSLP layer is somehow tight
to the authorization for certain protocol actions then we also have
to consider the case where the MN and the CN have to contribute to
the authorization decision. This situation appears, for example, in
the NAT/Firewall signaling case but also in the area of QoS
reservation where both parties might need to share the cost of a
reservation.
If both end hosts are authorized then some signaling message
exchanges are less difficult since the trigger message does not need
to include authorization information. Some problems, however, do not
disappear such as the session ownership problem and additional
problems might be caused by certain solution approaches. Since this
section does not discuss solutions the reader is referred to the [7]
draft which lists a few strawman proposals for addressing the session
ownership problem.
6.1.3 CN as data sender
In this section we consider the scenarios where the CN acts as a data
sender. Figure 1 shows the topology and the participating entities.
6.1.3.1 CN is authorizing entity
This scenario is similar to the one described in Section 6.1.1. No
additional problems arise with a scenario where the CN is both data
sender and also the authorizing entity. In Figure 8 the CN
authorizes the UCNR to delete the old segment and to establish a new
reservation along the new segment. Furthermore, at the shared
segment only an update of the flow identifier might be necessary.
MN UCRN CN
+ E.g.
<-----<-----<------<------<------<------<------- | Create
ACTION | new
+-----------------+ | +-----------------+ | State
| Action: | | | Action: | |
| 'create' along)| | | 'update' along)| |
| new segment) | | | shared segment)| |
+-----------------+ | +-----------------+ |
<------<------<--------+ |
+-----------------+ |
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| Action: | |
| 'delete' along)| |
| old segment) | |
+-----------------+ |
|
>----->----->------>------>------>------>------> |
ACK (along new path) |
|
<=============================================== +
Traffic
Figure 11: CN as data sender is authorized
Since the mobile node first detects the route changes. A trigger to
the CN allows the CN to quickly react on the route changes. There
are three variants:
- The MN sends a trigger to the CN and the CN starts signaling as
shown in Figure 11.
- The MN routes the message back along the reverse path using the
previously established state along the old route. This mechanism
only works if the MN is able to send messages along the old path.
As a generic mechanism this is not suggested.
- An intermediate node act on its own. This might be possible that
the UCRN is an entity which participates in the mobility signaling
(e.g., Mobility Anchor Point (MAP)) exchange. Depending on the
message exchange it needs to be studied whether the signaling
message provides sufficient authorization to trigger the NSIS
exchange.
6.1.3.2 MN is authorizing entity
In this scenario we consider the case where the CN is the data sender
but the MN authorizes actions. The considerations are similar to
those elaborated in Section 6.1.3 where the MN is the data sender but
the CN is the authorizing entity.
6.1.4 Multi-homing Scenarios
Multi-homing scenarios have the property that the more than one path
belongs to a signaling session. In Figure 12 the MN uses two
interfaces to route NSIS message towards the CN. The two individual
sessions are tight together with the same session identifier. The MN
needs to indicate that both reservations need to be kept alive (and
the DCRN should not delete a reservation). At the shared segment
only a single reservation is stored.
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From an authorization point of view the session ownership issues is
applicable since the DCRN needs to merge the two reservations into a
single one along the shared segment.
6.1.4.1 MN as data sender
This section shows the multi-homing scenario with the MN as a data
sender.
segment 2
+---+
^>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>| AR|>>>>>>>>>>>>>V
^ +---+ V
+----+ +----+ +--+
| MN | |DCRN|>>>>>>>>>>|CN|
|UCRN| | |>>>>>>>>>>| |
+----+ +----+ +--+
v +---+ ^ shared
v>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>| AR|>>>>>>>>>>>>>^ segment
+---+
segment 1
===============================================================>
Traffic
Figure 12: Multi-homed MN as data sender
If the MN is the authorizing entity then the session ownership
problem needs to be solved. Without solving this type of
authorization problem it is possible for an adversary to "join" the
reservation at the shared segment. Furthermore, it is an open issue
whether reservation merging is allowed only for cases where one flow
identifier is used at different interfaces or even with different
flow identifiers.
If the CN is the authorizing entity then, again, some message needs
to be sent from the CN to the MN to trigger the exchange or to route
the request backwards along the established path. The MN is
reachable via the two paths.
Mobility handling might be smoother since it is possible that only
one interface experiences an IP address change with all the
previously discussed implications.
6.1.4.2 CN as data sender
This section shows the multi-homing scenario with the CN as a data
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sender. The scenario is simpler (for the CN authorizing case) than
the one described in Section 6.1 since the signaling message along
the shared segment travels the previously established path. It shows
some similarities with a route change scenario. At the mobile node
itself the two paths merge which again leads to a session ownership
problem. How should the MN know whether a signaling message with the
same session identifier hitting a different interface belongs to the
indicated session authorized by the CN?
segment 2
+---+
v<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<| AR|<<<<<<<<<<<<<^
v +---+ ^
+----+ +----+ +--+
| MN | |UCRN|<<<<<<<<<<|CN|
|DCRN| | |<<<<<<<<<<| |
+----+ +----+ +--+
^ +---+ v shared
^<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<| AR|<<<<<<<<<<<<<v segment
+---+
segment 1
<=============================================================
Traffic
Figure 13: Multi-homed CN as data sender
If the MN is the authorizing entity then again communication between
the end hosts is required as a trigger. Routing the signaling
messages in the reverse path might, in some cases, also be possible.
6.1.5 Proxy Scenario
The proxy scenarios refer to those cases where one of the end hosts
or even both end hosts are not NSIS aware. Two security implications
need to be studied:
- First, there is an authorization issue with regard to the NSLP
application. For QoS signaling the end host (and the user) has to
authorize the QoS reservation since the reservation might require
the user is charged for it. Since the end host is not NSIS aware
some other mechanism or protocol needs to be available which
provides this functionality. For NAT/Firewall signaling delayed
authorization assures that both end hosts authorize the packet
filter creation at their local networks (particularly in case of
missing trust relationship between intermediate networks).
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- Second, the authorization issues which relate to the session
ownership problem also need to be studied. Since the session
ownership issues are related to the signaling participating nodes
and not to the users or the true end points we think that it does
not lead to complications. This is, however, only true if we
assume that authorization at the NSLP and authorization decisions
for the signaling message handling is decoupled.
6.1.6 Conclusion
This section tries to point to some authorization aspects for NSIS
signaling in a mobility environment. Performance is important in
mobility environments but a proper security handling accounts for a
high percentage of the total performance. It is important to
consider this aspect in the analysis of mobility proposals.
From the scenarios we can observe the following issues:
- Signaling in the direction of the data path is simpler than in the
opposite direction.
- There are many similarities between the scenarios where the MN
acts as a data sender and the scenarios the CN acts as a data
sender, particularly if multi-homing scenarios are included.
- Many authorization problems arise after the initial setup of
resources along the path. This problem can be stated as: "Is an
entity allowed to perform the indicated action?" Only a few
problems are related to the initial signaling message exchange.
- If the data sender triggers the signaling message exchange and
also provides authorization then the complexity can be kept fairly
low.
- NSLP authorization decisions should be treated separately from
authorization decisions which affect the signaling message
exchange.
During the work a few open issues have been selected:
- This section does not consider the different message types.
- The implication of price determination caused by mobility is
excluded from this description.
- It was tried to keep the description in this section very generic.
Implications of certain mobility protocols are therefore not
considered.
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7. Change History
The major change made to the initial version of the draft is to
re-arrange the issues addressed in the draft in order to clearly
identify general issues caused by mobility itself and NSIS
protocols-specific issues. The generic route changes-related text in
Section 4 was moved into Appendix to make this draft more
mobility-specific.
Specifically, the following changes have been made:
1. Removed the terminologies, 'uplink' and 'downlink' in Section 2.
2. Removed the terminology, 'local repair' in Sections 2 and 4.
3. Re-arranged all problems in Section 3 by merging the
'mobility-related issues with NSIS protocols' section and the
'problem statement and general considerations' section.
4. Removed the general considerations section in Section 3.
5. Modified the problem statement section and moved it into the
general problem section in Section 3.1.
6. Added more problems including 'Identification of the crossover
node', 'Key exchanges', and 'AA-related Issues' to Section 3.1
7. Added the 'Multihoming-related issues' to Section 3.2.4
8. Removed the issues on 'how to immediately delete the state on the
old path' in Section 3.2.
9. Moved the generic route changes-related text in Section 4.1 into
Appendix.
10. Removed the figure describing "NSIS signaling topology for
downstream signaling flow after the route changes in the middle of
the network" in Figure 2.
11. Added 'NSLP_IDs' to each node in Figure 1.
12. Removed the 'use cases of identifiers' section, and instead,
added the 'support for ping-pong type handover' section to Section
5.
13. Added this change history.
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8. References
8.1 Normative References
[1] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate Requirement
Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, March 1997.
8.2 Informative References
[2] Schulzrinne, H., "GIMPS: General Internet Messaging Protocol
for Signaling", draft-ietf-nsis-ntlp-04 (work in progress),
October 2004.
[3] Manner, J. and M. Kojo, "Mobility Related Terminology", RFC
3753, June 2004.
[4] Hancock, R., "Next Steps in Signaling: Framework",
draft-ietf-nsis-fw-07 (work in progress), December 2004.
[5] Bosch, S., Karagiannis, G. and A. McDonald, "NSLP for
Quality-of-Service signaling", draft-ietf-nsis-qos-nslp-05
(work in progress), October 2004.
[6] Lee, S., "Mobility Functions in the QoS-NSLP",
draft-lee-nsis-mobility-nslp-01 (work in progress), November
2003.
[7] Tschofenig, H., "Security Implications of the Session
Identifier", draft-tschofenig-nsis-sid-00 (work in progress),
June 2003.
[8] Tschofenig, H., "NSIS Authentication, Authorization and
Accounting Issues", draft-tschofenig-nsis-aaa-issues-01 (work
in progress), March 2003.
[9] Braden, B., Zhang, L., Berson, S., Herzog, S. and S. Jamin,
"Resource ReSerVation Protocol (RSVP) -- Version 1 Functional
Specification", RFC 2205, September 1997.
[10] Stiemerling, M., "A NAT/Firewall NSIS Signaling Layer Protocol
(NSLP)", draft-ietf-nsis-nslp-natfw-04 (work in progress),
October 2004.
[11] Dommety, G., "Fast Handovers for Mobile IPv6",
draft-ietf-mobileip-fast-mipv6-05 (work in progress), October
2002.
[12] Perkins, C., "IP Mobility Support for IPv4, revised",
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Internet-Draft NSIS Signaling in Mobility February 2005
draft-ietf-mip4-rfc3344bis-01 (work in progress), October 2004.
[13] Johnson, D., Perkins, C. and J. Arkko, "Mobility Support in
IPv6", RFC 3775, June 2004.
[14] Tschofenig, H., "Path-coupled NAT/Firewall Signaling Security
Problems", draft-tschofenig-nsis-natfw-security-problems-00
(work in progress), July 2004.
[15] Fessi, A., "Security Threats for the NAT/Firewall NSLP",
draft-fessi-nsis-natfw-threats-02 (work in progress), October
2004.
[16] Berger, L., Gan, D., Swallow, G., Pan, P., Tommasi, F. and S.
Molendini, "RSVP Refresh Overhead Reduction Extensions", RFC
2961, April 2001.
Authors' Addresses
Sung-Hyuck Lee
SAMSUNG Advanced Institute of Technology
San 14-1, Nongseo-ri, Giheung-eup
Yongin-si, Gyeonggi-do 449-712
KOREA
Phone: +82 31 280 9585
EMail: starsu.lee@samsung.com
Seong-Ho Jeong
Hankuk University of FS
89 Wangsan Mohyun
Yongin-si, Gyeonggi-do 449-791
KOREA
Phone: +82 31 330 4642
EMail: shjeong@hufs.ac.kr
Hannes Tschofenig
Siemens AG
Otto-Hahn-Ring 6
Munich, 81739
Germany
Phone:
EMail: Hannes.Tschofenig@siemens.com
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Xiaoming Fu
University of Goettingen
Telematics Group
Lotzestr. 16-18
Goettingen 37083
Germany
EMail: fu@cs.uni-goettingen.de
Jukka Manner
Department of Computer Science University of Helsinki
P.O. Box 26 (Teollisuuskatu 23)
HELSINKI, FIN-00014
Finland
Phone: +358-9-191-44210
EMail: jmanner@cs.helsinki.fi
Contributors
Many individuals have contributed to this draft. Since it was not
possible to list them all in the authors section, this section was
created to have a sincere respect for other authors, Paulo Mendes,
Robert Hancock and Roland Bless. Separating authors into two groups
was done without treating any one of them better (or worse) than
others.
Acknowledgement
The authors would like to thank Byoung-Joon Lee, Charles Q. Shen,
Cornelia Kappler, Henning Schulzrinne, and Jongho Bang for
significant contributions in four earlier drafts and the previous
draft.
Appendix A. Generic Route Changes
The mobility occurs due to the change of the network attachment
point, but the generic route changes is associated with load sharing,
load balancing, or a link (or node) failure. These cause divergence
(or convergence) between the old path along which state has already
been installed and the new path along which data forwarding will
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actually happen.
The route changes brings on the change of signaling topology and it
results in difference according to the types of route changes (e.g.,
the route changes or mobility). The route changes generally forms
two common paths, an old path, and a new path, where the old path and
the new path begin to diverge from one common path and afterward to
converge to another common path for each direction of signaling flows
(e.g., downstream or upstream flows) as shown in Figure 14.
Old path
+---+ +---+
^ --->|NE | ... |NE | ------V
common path ^ +---+ +---+ V common path
+--+ +----+ +----+ +--+
|S |-----> |DCRN| |DCRN| -------> |R |
| | | | | | | |
+--+ +----+ New path +----+ +--+
V +---+ +---+ ^
V --->|NE | ... |NAR| ------^
+---+ +---+
=======(downstream signaling followed by data flows) ======>
(a) The topology for downstream NSIS signaling flow after
route changes
Old path
+---+ +---+
v <---|NE | ... |NE | ----- ^
common path v +---+ +---+ ^ common path
+--+ +----+ +----+ +--+
|S |<----- |UCRN| |UCRN| <------- |R |
| | | | | | | |
+--+ +----+ New path +----+ +--+
^ +---+ +---+ v
^ <---|NE | ... |NAR| ----- v
+---+ +---+
<=====(upstream signaling followed by data flows) ======
(b) The topology for upstream NSIS signaling flow after
route changes
Figure.14 The topology for NSIS signaling in case of the route
changes
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