Network Working Group M. Mealling Internet-Draft Refactored Networks, LLC Expires: September 19, 2005 March 18, 2005 A Uniform Resource Name Namespace For The EPCglobal Electronic Product Code (EPC) draft-mealling-epc-urn-00.txt Status of this Memo This document is an Internet-Draft and is subject to all provisions of Section 3 of RFC 3667. By submitting this Internet-Draft, each author represents that any applicable patent or other IPR claims of which he or she is aware have been or will be disclosed, and any of which he or she become aware will be disclosed, in accordance with RFC 3668. This document may not be modified, and derivative works of it may not be created, except to publish it as an RFC and to translate it into languages other than English. Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), its areas, and its working groups. Note that other groups may also distribute working documents as Internet-Drafts. Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any time. It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference material or to cite them other than as "work in progress." The list of current Internet-Drafts can be accessed at http://www.ietf.org/ietf/1id-abstracts.txt. The list of Internet-Draft Shadow Directories can be accessed at http://www.ietf.org/shadow.html. This Internet-Draft will expire on September 19, 2005. Copyright Notice Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2005). Abstract This document describes a URN namespace that will identify various objects within the EPCglobal system for identifying products within ecommerce and supply chain management applications. Mealling Expires September 19, 2005 [Page 1] Internet-Draft The EPC URN March 2005 1. Introduction The EPCglobal Network is set of specifications for reading, managing and acting on object codes plus other sensor data as products pass through a supply chain. Events and metadata about a product are stored in EPC Information Services (EPC-IS) that are essentially web services that implement agreed upon schema and services. Each object that is tracked by the EPCglobal Network is identified by one or more managed identifiers. In many cases these identification systems existed prior to the Internet becoming widely used. One such namespace is the Global Trade Item Number, or GTIN. GTINs are widely used in global commerce and are managed jointly by the European Article Numbering (EAN) Association and the Uniform Code Council (UCC). In order for the EPCglobal Network to leverage the Internet to the fullest extent possible, the GTIN namespace (and others such as Global Location Numbers (GLNs), Serialized Shipping Container Code (SSCC), etc) need to be directly compatible with the URI family of identifiers. The use of GTINs, GLNs and SSCCs are all managed by the EAN.UCC partnership known as EPCglobal, Inc. For these, and possibly future namespaces, a single Uniform Resource Name (URN) Namespace ID (NID) is being requested: 'epc'. Each of the namespaces mentioned will have a separate sub-space beneath the top level 'epc' NID. In addition to existing supply chain naming systems, the EPCglobal Network will require new namespaces for naming system components. In many cases the EPCglobal Network is XML [10] based and as such will require naming schemes for its XML schema [8] and various namespaces [9]. Since the EPCglobal Network is engineered for wide spread and general use, this namespace specification is a formal one and the namespace ID that is being requested is 'epc'. It is important to note that it is the explicit intent that various sub-namespaces actually name real, physical objects and/or corporeal entities. 2. Specification Template Namespace ID: "epc" requested. Registration Information: Mealling Expires September 19, 2005 [Page 2] Internet-Draft The EPC URN March 2005 Registration Version Number: 1 Registration Date: 2005-02-15 Declared registrant of the namespace: EPCglobal, Inc. is a joint venture of EAN and the UCC Princeton Pike Corporate Center 1009 Lenox Drive, Suite 202 Lawrenceville, NJ 08648, USA msouthall@epcglobalus.org Tel: +1-609-620-4542 Declaration of structure: The normative specification of the structure of the EPC namespace is "EPC Tag Data Standards" [7]. The examples given below are not normative. The 'epc' namespace is a set of sub-namespaces that can be extended in the future. The following ABNF defines how the sub-namespaces are identified and any restrictions on their syntax (definitions not specified below can be found in RFC 2141 [1]): EPC-URN = "urn:epc:" sub-namespace-name ":" sub-namespace sub-namespace-name = [ 1* ] sub-namespace = ::= | | | "-" ::= "A" | "B" | "C" | "D" | "E" | "F" | "G" | "H" | "I" | "J" | "K" | "L" | "M" | "N" | "O" | "P" | "Q" | "R" | "S" | "T" | "U" | "V" | "W" | "X" | "Y" | "Z" ::= "a" | "b" | "c" | "d" | "e" | "f" | "g" | "h" | "i" | "j" | "k" | "l" | "m" | "n" | "o" | "p" | "q" | "r" | "s" | "t" | "u" | "v" | "w" | "x" | "y" | "z" ::= "0" | "1" | "2" | "3" | "4" | "5" | "6" | "7" | "8" | "9" For example, the sub-namespace 'sgtin' has the following definition (this ABNF is non-normative): Mealling Expires September 19, 2005 [Page 3] Internet-Draft The EPC URN March 2005 SGTIN-URI = "urn:epc:id:sgtin:" SGTINURIBody SGTINURIBody = 2*(PaddedNumericComponent ".") NumericComponent NumericComponent = ZeroComponent | NonZeroComponent ZeroComponent = "0" NonZeroComponent = NonZeroDigit *Digit PaddedNumericComponent = *Digit Digit = "0" | NonZeroDigit NonZeroDigit = "1" | "2" | "3" | "4" | "5" | "6" | "7" | "8" | "9" This equates to a namespace that has three period separated series of digits: urn:epc:id:sgtin:900100.0003456.1234567 The first series is a company prefix, the 2nd denotes a product reference assigned by that company, and the third is a serial number for a specific instance of their product. Note that leading zeros are significant. Relevant ancillary documentation: The standards that define the EPCglobal Network and the processes for creating new sub-namespaces are managed by EPCglobal, Inc and can be found on its website. Several sub-namespaces are defined in the "EPC Tag Data Standards" [7] and the "PML Core Specification 1.0" [6] specifications. Identifier uniqueness considerations: The namespaces that make up the 'epc' namespace are all managed by an organization with almost 50 years of namespace management experience. In all cases (existing or new) the uniqueness of each namespace is an inherent part of the EPCglobal Network. Identifier persistence considerations: The assignment process guarantees that names are not reassigned and that the binding between the name and and its resource is permanent, regardless of any standards or organizational changes. Process of identifier assignment: Names are assigned by the EPCglobal standards publication process and by any entities that are sub-delegated by EPCglobal. It is important to note that in many cases the names assigned will explicitly denote physical objects and not an electronic representation of that object. For example, a Mealling Expires September 19, 2005 [Page 4] Internet-Draft The EPC URN March 2005 'get' type operation on some identifiers can cause a physical object to be transported from one physical location to another. Process of identifier resolution: Certain sub-namespaces are resolved via the Object Naming Service which is defined in "Auto-ID Object Naming Service (ONS) 1.0" [5] which is a valid implementation of the Dynamic Delegation Discovery System that is defined in RFC 3401 [4]. Rules for Lexical Equivalence: The entire URN is case-sensitive. Conformance with URN Syntax: There are no additional characters reserved except as noted in the ABNF above. Validation mechanism: In the case of each sub-namespace there will be namespace specific rules for determining validity. In each case the reader is referred to the appropriate EPC Global maintained documentation. Scope: Global 3. IANA Considerations This document includes a URN Namespace registration that is to be entered into the IANA registry for URN NIDs. 4. Namespace Considerations Due to EPCglobal Inc being a partnership between the two internationally recognized authoritaties for identifiers the EPC contains, this namespace represents the best approach to naming products and entities within the world of supply chain management and ecommerce in general. There are no other alternative namespaces that have the level of authority and industry acceptance that the EPC does. Mealling Expires September 19, 2005 [Page 5] Internet-Draft The EPC URN March 2005 5. Community Considerations The EPCglobal Network is intended to bring the Internet to the world of supply chain management and beyond. It can be used to tie physical objects to their virtual descriptions and as such has many wide ranging applications for the average Internet use. Thus it is very much the intent that this namespace and the entire EPCglobal Network consider the entire Internet as the scope of its community. 6. Security Considerations The EPCglobal Network is based almost exclusively on Internet and Web standards. Thus the security impacts of each of its underlying technologies should be examined for weaknesses and threats. The primary threats will come from the fact that these names will identify physical things that can be of high value, thus the temptation to spoof metadata about that identifier (its cost, size, etc) will be much greater. Therefore the role of digital signatures, secure resolution mechanisms and trust relationships is very fundamental to the system. 7. References 7.1 Normative References [1] Moats, R., "URN Syntax", RFC 2141, May 1997. [2] Crocker, D., Ed. and P. Overell, "Augmented BNF for Syntax Specifications: ABNF", RFC 2234, November 1997. [3] Berners-Lee, T., Fielding, R. and L. Masinter, "Uniform Resource Identifiers (URI): Generic Syntax", RFC 2396, August 1998. [4] Mealling, M., "Dynamic Delegation Discovery System (DDDS) Part One: The Comprehensive DDDS", RFC 3401, October 2002. [5] Mealling, M., "EPCglobal Network Object Name Service (ONS) 1.0", EPCglobal ONS 1.0, August 2003, . [6] EPCglobal, Inc., "PML Core Specification 1.0", EPCglobal PML 1.0, September 2003, . [7] EPCglobal, Inc., "EPC(tm) Tag Data Standards Version 1.1, Rev 1.26", EPCglobal Tag Data Standards 1.1, Feburary 2004, Mealling Expires September 19, 2005 [Page 6] Internet-Draft The EPC URN March 2005 . 7.2 Non-normative References [8] Maloney, M., Beech, D., Thompson, H. and N. Mendelsohn, "XML Schema Part 1: Structures Second Edition", W3C REC REC-xmlschema-1-20041028, October 2004. [9] Tobin, R., Hollander, D., Layman, A. and T. Bray, "Namespaces in XML 1.1", W3C REC REC-xml-names11-20040204, February 2004. [10] Yergeau, F., Paoli, J., Sperberg-McQueen, C., Bray, T. and E. Maler, "Extensible Markup Language (XML) 1.0 (Third Edition)", W3C REC REC-xml-20040204, February 2004. Author's Address Michael Mealling Refactored Networks, LLC 1635 Old Hwy 41 Suite 112, Box 138 Kennesaw, GA 30152 US Phone: +1 678 581 9656 Email: michael@refactored-networks.com URI: http://www.refactored-networks.com Mealling Expires September 19, 2005 [Page 7] Internet-Draft The EPC URN March 2005 Intellectual Property Statement The IETF takes no position regarding the validity or scope of any Intellectual Property Rights or other rights that might be claimed to pertain to the implementation or use of the technology described in this document or the extent to which any license under such rights might or might not be available; nor does it represent that it has made any independent effort to identify any such rights. Information on the procedures with respect to rights in RFC documents can be found in BCP 78 and BCP 79. 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Disclaimer of Validity This document and the information contained herein are provided on an "AS IS" basis and THE CONTRIBUTOR, THE ORGANIZATION HE/SHE REPRESENTS OR IS SPONSORED BY (IF ANY), THE INTERNET SOCIETY AND THE INTERNET ENGINEERING TASK FORCE DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY THAT THE USE OF THE INFORMATION HEREIN WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY RIGHTS OR ANY IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. Copyright Statement Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2005). This document is subject to the rights, licenses and restrictions contained in BCP 78, and except as set forth therein, the authors retain all their rights. Acknowledgment Funding for the RFC Editor function is currently provided by the Internet Society. Mealling Expires September 19, 2005 [Page 8]