| Internet-Draft | SCHC Architecture | October 2025 |
| Pelov, et al. | Expires 20 April 2026 | [Page] |
This document defines the SCHC architecture.¶
This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.¶
Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). Note that other groups may also distribute working documents as Internet-Drafts. The list of current Internet-Drafts is at https://datatracker.ietf.org/drafts/current/.¶
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This Internet-Draft will expire on 20 April 2026.¶
Copyright (c) 2025 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the document authors. All rights reserved.¶
This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal Provisions Relating to IETF Documents (https://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of publication of this document. Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect to this document. Code Components extracted from this document must include Revised BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as described in the Revised BSD License.¶
The IETF LPWAN WG defined the necessary operations to enable IPv6 over selected Low-Power Wide Area Networking (LPWAN) radio technologies. [rfc8376] presents an overview of those technologies.¶
The Static Context Header Compression (SCHC) [rfc8724] technology is the core product of the IETF LPWAN working group and was the basis to form the SCHC Working Group. [rfc8724] defines a generic framework for header compression and fragmentation, based on a static context that is pre-installed on the SCHC endpoints.¶
This document details the constitutive elements of a SCHC-based solution, and how the solution can be deployed. It provides a general architecture for a SCHC deployment, positioning the required specifications, describing the possible deployment types, and indicating models whereby the rules can be distributed and installed to enable reliable and scalable operations.¶
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "NOT RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in BCP 14 [RFC2119] [RFC8174] when, and only when, they appear in all capitals, as shown here.¶
C/D. Compression and Decompression.¶
Context. All the information related to the Rules for a SCHC Header operation, which can be either Non-Compression, C/D, F/R, or CORECONF_Management.¶
FID. Field Identifiers, describing the name of the field in a protocol header.¶
F/R. Fragmentation and Reassembly.¶
Rule. A description of the header fields to performs compression/ decompression, fragmentation/reassembly, SCHC end-points and CORECONF_Management.¶
SCHC Gateway (end-point). The SCHC end-point located upstream, e.g., in a Network Core Software.¶
SCHC Device (end-point). The SCHC end-point located downstream, e.g., in a constrained physical device.¶
SCHC Header. A SCHC Header contains the information necessary for a SCHC operation, e.g., a Rule ID and a residue. The SCHC Control Header transports SCHC's control information whereas the SCHC Data Header transports user payload that was processed by SCHC.¶
SCHC end-point. An entity (e.g., Device, Application and Network Gateway) involved in the SCHC process. Each SCHC end-point will have its Set of Rules (SoR), based on the profile, the protocols, the device, the behaviour and a Set of Variables (SoV).¶
SCHC Instance. The session between SCHC end-points in two or more peer nodes operating SCHC to communicate using a common SoR and a matching SoV. There are at least two SCHC Instances involved per SCHC stratum, one SCHC Control Instance that manages the SCHC Control Header to discriminate the SCHC Data Instance(s) and one or more SCHC Data Instance(s) that handle(s) the SCHC Data Header, for, e.g., compression and decompression operations.¶
SCHC Instance Manager. Provides the management of SCHC end-points, the SoR of each end-point and the dialog between hosts to keep the SCHC synchronization, and the establishment of SCHC Instances with peer nodes.¶
SoR (Set of rules). Group of Rules used in a SCHC end-point. The set of rules contains Rules for different nature as compression, no compression, fragmentation, SCHC end-points and CORECONF management.¶
SoV (Set of Variables). External information that needs to be known to identify the correct protocol, the SCHC Instance id, and the flow when there is one.¶
SCHC Stratum. A SCHC Stratum is the SCHC analoguous to a classical layer in the IP architecture, but its operation may cover multiple IP layers or only a subset of a layer.¶
This section specifies the principal blocks defined for building and using the SCHC architecture in any network topology and protocol.¶
A SCHC Stratum is the SCHC analoguous to a classical layer in the IP architecture, but its operation may cover multiple IP layers or only a subset of a layer, e.g., IP only, IP+UDP, CoAP, or OSCORE [rfc8824]. The term stratum is thus used to avoid confusion with traditional layers. Also, SCHC Strata are not stacked, though they can be nested.¶
The SCHC Stratum data in a datagram is composed of a SCHC Control Header (which may be compressed to the point that it is fully implicit and thus elided), a SCHC Data Header (that is used to uncompress a section of the SCHC datagram), and possibly some remaining payload that is unaffected by the SCHC Stratum. The SCHC Stratum operation requires at least 2 end-points, one for the SCHC Control Header and one or more for the SCHC Data Header.¶
A SCHC datagram may contain additional stratum data, to be handled by sequential (nested) SCHC Strata, where the inner (nested) Stratum operates within the decompressed/reassembled payload of the outter (nesting) Stratum.¶
A SCHC Stratum is instantiated in participating nodes as a pair of SCHC end-points, and matching SCHC end-points in communicating nodes are associated to form a SCHC end-point. A SCHC end-point may be Point to point (P2P), or Point to Multipoint. A P2MP SCHC end-point is unidirectional, meaning that all the SCHC datagrams are generated by the same node. A P2P SCHC end-point may be unidirectional or bidirectional, symmetrical (between peers) or asymetrical (between a device and an application).¶
A SCHC end-point operates datagram fragmentation and/or data compression and decompression, and maintains the state and timers associated with the Stratum operation over the consecutive datagrams or fragments.¶
The SCHC end-points that handle the compression for nested Strata might differ for the same datagram, meaning that the payload of a given Stratum might be compressed/uncompressed by a different entity, possibly in a different node. It results that the degree of compression (the number of Strata) for a given datagram may vary as the datagram progresses through the layers inside a node and then through the network.¶
The key to determine how to decompress a SCHC Control Header in a stratum is called a Discriminator.¶
The Discriminator is typically extrinsic to the stratum data.¶
It may be found in the datagram context, e.g., the ID of the interface, VLAN, SSID, or PPP SCHC Instance on which the datagram is received.¶
It may also be received in the datagram, natively or uncompressed from a nesting stratum, e.g.:¶
A source and destination MAC or IP addresses of the datagram carrying SCHC datagrams¶
A source and destination port number of the transport layer carrying SCHC datagrams¶
A next header field¶
An MPLS label¶
A TLS Association¶
Any other kind of connection id.¶
The Discriminator enables to determine the SCHC end-point that is used to decompress the SCHC Control Header, called a SCHC Control end-point.¶
Once uncompressed, the SCHC Control Header enables to determine the SCHC end-point, called a SCHC Data end-point, that is used to restore the datagram data that is compressed in the stratum.¶
The SCHC Control end-point manages the SCHC Control Headers and provides the information and the selection of a SCHC Data end-point.¶
The rules for that end-point might be such that all the fields in the SCHC Control Header are well-known, in which case the header is fully elided in the stratum data and recreated from the rules.¶
The rules might also leverage intrinsic data that is found in-line in the stratum data, in which case the first bits of the stratum data are effectively residue to the compression of the SCHC Control Header. Finally, the rules may leverage extrinsic data as the Discriminator does.¶
Figure 1 illustrates the case where a given stratum may compress multiple protocols SCHC Instances, each corresponding to a different SCHC Data end-point.¶
+---------------+---------------+---------------+ S
| SCHC Data Hdr | SCHC Data Hdr | SCHC Data Hdr | C
| end-point___ | end-point___ | end-point___ | H
| [SoR] | [SoR] | [SoR] | C
| [___] | [___] | [___] |
| | | | S
| | | | T
+----inst_id1---+----inst_id2---+----inst_id3---+ R
. SCHC Stratum end-point ___ . A
. [SoR] . T
. [___] . U
+...............................................+ M
_____________^
/
/
+-- Discriminator: (SCHC Control Header)(SCHC Data Header)
Each SCHC Data end-point uses its own Set of Rules,
but share the same SCHC Control Header.
The SCHC Control Header carries information that is required for the SCHC strata operation. For example, it selects the correct end-point and checks the validity of the datagram. There IS NOT always a RuleID if there is only one Rule for the SCHC Control Header, whose length is 0. The SCHC Control Header format is not fixed, and the SoR MUST have one or more Rules describing the formats. SCHC Control Header contains different fields. For the end-point, if the SCHC Control Header identifies, e.g., the next protocol in the stack, the format of the SCHC Control Header may be represented as shown in Figure 2.¶
Non-compressed SCHC Control Header Format: +- - - - - - - - - +- - - - - - -+- - -+ | SCHC Instance ID | Protocol ID | CRC | +- - - - - - - - - +- - - - - - -+- - -+ SCHC Control Header Compressed: +- - - - -+- - - - - - - - - - + | Rule ID | Compressed Residue | +- - - - -+- - - - - - - - - - + Rule uses to compressed the SCHC Control Header: RuleID +------------+--+---+--+-----+------+-----------+ | FID |FL|POS|DI| TV | MO | CDA | +------------+--+---+--+-----+------+-----------+ | SCHC.sesid |10| 1 |Bi|0x00 |MSB(7)| LSB | | SCHC.proto | 8| 1 |Bi|value|equal | not-sent | | SCHC.CRC | 8| 1 |Bi| |ignore| value-sent| +------------+--+---+--+-----+------+-----------+
In this example the Rule defines:¶
A SCHC InstanceID is 10 bits length and it is used to identify the SoR used for this end-point of SCHC.¶
A Protocol ID in 1-byte length giving the value send in the layer below the SCHC datagram to identify the uncompressed protocol stack.¶
And A CRC. The CRC field is 8 bits length and covers the SCHC Control Header and the SCHC datagram from error. When it is elided by the compression, the layer-4 checksum MUST be replaced by another validation sequence.¶
A SCHC Data end-point handles this node's side of a SCHC Data instance? It is characterized by a particular SoR common with the corresponding distant end-point. The [rfc8724] defines a protocol operation between a pair of peers. In a SCHC strata, several SCHC end-points may contain different SoR.¶
When the SCHC Device is a highly constrained unit, there is typically only one end-point for that Device, and all the traffic from and to the device is exchanged with the same Network Gateway. All the traffic can thus be implicitly associated with the single end-point that the device supports, and the Device does not need to manipulate the concept. For that reason, SCHC avoids to signal explicitly the end-point identification in its data datagrams.¶
The Network Gateway, on the other hand, maintains multiple end-points, one per SCHC Device. The end-point is derived from the lower layer, typically the source of an incoming SCHC datagram as a discriminator in the Figure 1. The end-point is used in particular to select the set of rules that apply to the SCHC Device, and the current state of their exchange, e.g., timers and previous fragments.¶
As defined in section 5.1 of [rfc8724], a SCHC datagram (or packet) is composed of the compressed header called the SCHC Data Header followed by the uncompressed remainder payload from the original datagram (or packet). The SCHC Data Header, contains the data generated by the SCHC operation. It is composed of a RuleID followed by the content described in the Rule. The content may be a C/D datagram, a F/R datagram, a CORECONF_Management or a Non Compressed datagram.¶
<------ Compressed Header ------> <- Uncompressed Data -> +------------------------------------------------------+ | SCHC Datagram | +------------------------------------------------------+ +---------------------------------+--------------------+ | SCHC Data Header | Payload | +---------------------------------+--------------------+ +----------+----------------------+--------------------+ | RuleID | Rule Content | Payload | +----------+----------------------+--------------------+
Figure 4 shows the compressed header format that is composed of the RuledID and a Compressed Residue, which is the output of compressing a datagram header with a Rule.¶
C/D Compressed SCHC Data Header: +------------+----------------------+ | RuleID | Compressed Residue | +------------+----------------------+ F/R Compressed SCHC Data Header: +------------+----------------------+--------+--...--+--------+ | RuleID | Fragmentation Header | Tile_1 | | Tile_n | +------------+----------------------+--------+--...--+--------+ CORECONF_Management SCHC Data Header: +------------+----------------------+ | RuleID | Compressed Residue | +------------+----------------------+
A SCHC profile is the specification to adapt the use of SCHC with the necessities of the technology to which it is applied. In the case of star topologies and because LPWAN technologies [rfc8376] have strict yet distinct constraints, e.g., in terms of maximum frame size, throughput, and directionality, also a SCHC end-point and the fragmentation model with the parameters' values for its use.¶
Appendix D. "SCHC Parameters" of [rfc8724] lists the information that an LPWAN technology-specific document must provide to profile SCHC fragmentation for that technology.¶
As an example, [rfc9011] provides the SCHC fragmentation profile for LoRaWAN networks.¶
The SCHC operation requires a shared sense of which SCHC Device is Uplink (Dev to App) and which is Downlink (App to Dev), see [rfc8376]. In a star deployment, the hub is always considered Uplink and the spokes are Downlink. The expectation is that the hub and spoke derive knowledge of their role from the network configuration and SCHC does not need to signal which is hub thus Uplink vs. which is spoke thus Downlink. In other words, the link direction is determined from extrinsic properties, and is not advertised in the protocol.¶
Nevertheless, SCHC is very generic and its applicability is not limited to star-oriented deployments and/or to use cases where applications are very static and the state provisioned in advance. In particular, a peer-to-peer (P2P) SCHC end-point (see Section 4.4) may be set up between peers of equivalent capabilities, and the link direction cannot be inferred, either from the network topology nor from the device capability.¶
In that case, by convention, the device that initiates the connection that sustains the SCHC end-point is considered as being Downlink, i.e. it plays the role of the Dev in [rfc8724].¶
This convention can be reversed, e.g., by configuration, but for proper SCHC operation, it is required that the method used ensures that both ends are aware of their role, and then again this determination is based on extrinsic properties.¶
SCHC Rules are a description of the header protocols fields, into a list of Field Descriptors. The [rfc8724] gives the format of the Rule description for C/D, F/R and non-compression. In the same manner the SCHC Control Header and SCHc CORECONF_Management will use the [rfc8724] field descriptors to compress the format information.¶
Each type of Rule is identified with a RuleID. There are different types of Rules: C/D, F/R, SCHC Control Header, CORECONF_Management and No Compression. Notice that each Rule type used an independent range of RuleID to identify its rules.¶
A Rule does not describe how the compressor parses a datagram header. Rules only describe the behavior for each header field.¶
SCHC Action. ToDo¶
RFC9363 writes that only the management can be done by the two entities of the end-point, and other SoR cannot be manipulated.¶
Management rules are explicitly define in the SoR, see Figure 5. They are compression Rules for CORECONF messages to get or modify the SoR of the end-point. The management can be limited with the [I-D.ietf-schc-access-control] access definition.¶
+-----------------+ +-----------------+ | ^ | | ^ | | C/D ! M ___ | | ! M ___ | | +-->[SoR] | ... | +-->[SoR] | | ! [___] | | ! [___] | | ! | | ! | | F/R | | F/R | +------ins_id1----+-----ins_idi-----+------ins_idn----+ . C/D ! ___ . . +--------------------->[SoR] . . F/R M [___] . +.................. Discriminator ....................+
The SCHC Instance Manager provides the management of SCHC end-points, the SoR of each end-point and the dialog between hosts to keep the SCHC synchronization, and the establishment of SCHC Instances with peer nodes. Changes that involve the SoR must be transactional, in a way that ensures that the compression and decompression of a datagram is done with the same SoR on every end-points.¶
The management of the SCHC end-points includes the capability for the end-points to modify the common SoR, by:¶
The rule management uses the CORECONF interface based on CoAP. The management traffic is carried as SCHC compressed datagrams tagged to some specific rule IDs.¶
A SCHC end-point, summarized in the Figure 6, implies C/D and/or F/R and CORECONF_Management and SCHC end-points Rules present in both end and that both ends are provisioned with the same SoR.¶
----- -----
[ SoR ] [ SoR ]
----- -----
. .
. .
. .
+- M ---+ +- M ---+
<===| R & D |<=== <===| C & F |<===
===>| C & F |===> ===>| R & D |===>
+-------+ +-------+
A common rule representation that expresses the SCHC rules in an interoperable fashion is needed to be able to provision end-points from different vendors to that effect, [rfc9363] defines a rule representation using the YANG [rfc7950] formalism.¶
[rfc9363] defines a YANG data model to represent the rules. This enables the use of several protocols for rule management, such as NETCONF[RFC6241], RESTCONF[RFC8040], and CORECONF[I-D.ietf-core-comi]. NETCONF uses SSH, RESTCONF uses HTTPS, and CORECONF uses CoAP(s) as their respective transport layer protocols. The data is represented in XML under NETCONF, in JSON[RFC8259] under RESTCONF and in CBOR[RFC8949] under CORECONF.¶
create
----- read +=======+
[ SoR ]<------->|Rule |<-----+ NETCONF,
----- update |Manager| | RESTCONF or
delete +=======+ | CORECONF
+--------------------------+ request
|
v M
+---+---+
<===| R & D |<===
===>| C & F |===>
+-------+
The Rule Manager (RM) is in charge of handling data derived from the YANG Data Model and apply changes to the context and SoR of each SCHC end-point Figure 7.¶
The RM is an Application using the Internet to exchange information, therefore:¶
for the network-level SCHC, the communication does not require routing. Each of the end-points having an RM and both RMs can be viewed on the same link, therefore wellknown Link Local addresses can be used to identify the Device and the core RM. L2 security MAY be deemed as sufficient, if it provides the necessary level of protection.¶
for application-level SCHC, routing is involved and global IP addresses SHOULD be used. End-to-end encryption is RECOMMENDED.¶
Management messages can also be carried in the negotiation protocol, for instace, the [I-D.ietf-schc-over-ppp] proposes a solution. The RM traffic may be itself compressed by SCHC: if CORECONF protocol is used, [rfc8824] can be applied.¶
As described in [rfc8824], SCHC combining several SCHC end-points. The [rfc8724] states that a SCHC end-point needs the rules to process C/D and F/R before the SCHC Instance starts and that the SoR of the end-point control layer cannot be modified. However, the rules may be updated in certain end-points to improve the performance of C/D, F/R, or CORECONF_Management. The [I-D.ietf-schc-access-control] defines the possible modifications and who can modify, update, create and delete Rules or part of them in the end-points' SoR.¶
As represented in Figure 8, the compression of the IP and UDP headers may be operated by a network SCHC end-point whereas the end-to-end compression of the application payload happens between the Device and the application. The compression of the application payload may be split in two end-points to deal with the encrypted portion of the application PDU. Fragmentation applies before LPWAN transmission layer.¶
(Device) (NGW) (App)
+--------+ +--------+
A S | CoAP | | CoAP |
p C | inner | | inner |
p H +--------+ +--------+
. C | SCHC | | SCHC |
| inner | cryptographical boundary | inner |
-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-.._.-._.-._.-._.-._
A S | CoAP | | CoAP |
p C | outer | | outer |
p H +--------+ +--------+
. C | SCHC | | SCHC |
| outer | layer / functional boundary | outer |
-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.--._.-._.-._.-._
N . UDP . . UDP .
e .......... .................. ..........
t . IPv6 . . IPv6 . . IPv6 .
w S .......... .................. ..........
o C .SCHC/L3 . . SCHC/L3. . . .
r H .......... .......... . . .
k C . LPWAN . . LPWAN . . . .
.......... .................. ..........
((((LPWAN)))) ------ Internet ------
This document defines a generic architecture for SCHC that can be used at any of these levels. The goal of the architectural document is to orchestrate the different protocols and data model defined by the LPWAN and SCHC working groups to design an operational and interoperable framework for allowing IP application over constrained networks.¶
The Figure 9 shows the protocol stack and the corresponding SCHC stratas enabling the compression of the different protocol headers. The SCHC Control Header eases the introduction of intermediary host in the end-to-end communication transparently. All the SCHC Control Headers are compressed and in some cases are elided, for example for LPWAN networks. The layers using encryption does not have a SCHC Control Header in the middle because they are the same entity. Figure 10 shows an example of an IP/UDP/CoAP in an LPWAN network.¶
DEV NGW APP
{[(Encrypted Application Layer)]} . . . . . . . . {[(EAL)]}
(Application Layer Protocol) . . . . . . . . . . .({[ALP]})
(SCHC) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ({[SCHC]})
{[(Encrypted Security Layer)]} . . . . . . . . . .{[(ESL)]}
{(Security Layer Protocol)}. . . . . . . . . . . . .{(SLP)}
{(SCHC)} . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . {(SCHC)}
(Transport Layer Protocol). . . (TLP) TLP . . . . . .TLP
{(SCHC)} . . . . . . . . . . {(SCHC)}
(Internet Layer Protocol) . . . (IP) IP . . . . . . IP
(SCHC). . . . . . . . . . . . .(SCHC)
Network Layer Protocol . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . NLP
Where: {} Optional; [] Encrypted; () Compressed.
In Figure 9, each line represents a layer or a stratum, parentheses surround a compressed header, and if it is optional, it has curly brackets. All the SCHC strata are compressed. Square brackets represent the encrypted data; if the encryption is optional, curly brackets precede the square brackets.¶
Figure 10 represents the stack of SCHC end-points that operate over 3 strata, one for OSCORE, one for CoAP, and one for IP and UDP.¶
+--------------------------OSCORE-------------------------+
| +-----------------+ +-----------------+ |
| | ^ | | ^ | |
| | C/D ! M ___ | | ! M ___ | |
S | | +-->[SoR] | ... | +-->[SoR] | |
C | | ! [___] | | ! [___] | |
H | | ! | | ! | |
C | | F/R | | F/R | |
| +------ins_id1----+-----ins_idi-----+------ins_idn----+ |
| | C/D ! (OSCORE) ___ | |
| | +--------------------->[SoR] | |
| | F/R M [___] | |
+------- Discriminator: IP:A->B/UDP, prot = OSCORE--------+
IP/UDP,port=CoAP CoAP ( ) (OSCORE)
^ _____^ ^
| / |
| (SCHC Control Header)( SCHC-compressed data)
|
+-------- | ---------------CoAP---------------------------+
| +-----------------+ +-----------------+ |
| | ^ | | ^ | |
| | C/D ! M ___ | | ! M ___ | |
S | | +-->[SoR] | ... | +-->[SoR] | |
C | | ! [___] | | ! [___] | |
H | | ! | | ! | |
C | | F/R | | F/R | |
| +------ins_id1----+-----ins_idi-----+------ins_idn----+ |
| | C/D ! (CoAP) ___ | |
| | +--------------------->[SoR] | |
| | F/R M [___] | |
+------- Discriminator: IP:A->B/UDP port=SCHC -----------+
IP/UDP ( ) (CoAP) PAYLOAD2
^ ^ ^_____________
| | \
| +-(SCHC Control Header)( SCHC-compressed data)
|
+-------- | --------------IP/UDP--------------------------+
| +------ | --------+ +-----------------+ |
| | | | | ^ | |
| | C/D ! M ___ | | ! M ___ | |
S | | +-->[SoR] | ... | +-->[SoR] | |
C | | ! [___] | | ! [___] | |
H | | ! | | ! | |
C | | F/R | | F/R | |
| +------ins_id1----+-----ins_idi-----+------ins_idn----+ |
| | C/D ! (IP/UDP) | |
| | +--------------------->[SoR] | |
| | F/R M [___] | |
+-+-----------Discriminator: interface ID -------+-+
N ______________^
E /
T | ( ) (IP/UDP) PAYLOAD1
W | ^ ^_______
| | \
+-(SCHC Control Header)( SCHC-compressed data)
SCHC [rfc8724] specifies an extreme compression capability based on a description that must match on the compressor and decompressor side. This description comprises a set of Compression/Decompression (C/D) rules.¶
The SCHC Parser analyzes incoming datagrams and creates a list of fields that it matches against the compression rules. The rule that matches is used to compress the datagram, and the rule identifier (RuleID) is transmitted together with the compression residue to the decompressor. Based on the RuleID and the residue, the decompressor can rebuild the original datagram and forward it in its uncompressed form over the Internet. When no Rule matches the header, the No Compression Rule is used. When several Rules match the header the implementation must choose one. How it is done or based on which parameters is out of the scope of this document. SCHC compresses datagrams and there is no notion of flows.¶
[rfc8724] also provides a Fragmentation/Reassembly (F/R) capability to cope with the maximum and/or variable frame size of a Link, which is extremely constrained in the case of an LPWAN network.¶
If a SCHC-compressed datagram is too large to be sent in a single Link-Layer PDU, the SCHC fragmentation can be applied on the compressed datagram. The process of SCHC fragmentation is similar to that of compression; the fragmentation rules that are programmed for this Device are checked to find the most appropriate one, regarding the SCHC datagram size, the link error rate, and the reliability level required by the application.¶
The ruleID allows to determine if it is a compression or fragmentation rule or any other type of Rule.¶
SCHC can be used in multiple environments and multiple protocols. It was designed by default to work on native MAC frames with LPWAN technologies such as LoRaWAN[rfc9011], IEEE std 802.15.4 [I-D.ietf-6lo-schc-15dot4], and SigFox[rfc9442].¶
To operate SCHC over Ethernet, IPv6, and UDP, the definition of, respectively, an Ethertype, an IP Protocol Number, and a UDP Port Number are necessary, more in [I-D.ietf-intarea-schc-protocol-numbers]. In either case, there's a need for a SCHC Control Header that is sufficient to identify the SCHC peers (endpoints) and their role (device vs. app), as well as the SCHC Instance between those peers that the datagram pertains to.¶
In either of the above cases, the expectation is that the SCHC Control Header is transferred in a compressed form. This implies that the rules to uncompress the header are well known and separate from the rules that are used to uncompress the SCHC Data Header. The expectation is that for each stratum, the format of the SCHC Control Header and the compression rules are well known, with enough information to identify the SCHC Instance at that stratum, but there is no expectation that they are the same across strata.¶
The LPWAN architecture (Figure 15) generalizes the model to any kind of peers. In the case of more capable devices, a SCHC Device may maintain more than one end-point with the same peer, or a set of different peers. Since SCHC does not signal the end-point in its datagrams, the information must be derived from a lower layer point to point information. For end-point, the SCHC end-point control can be associated one-to-one with a tunnel, a TLS SCHC Instance, or a TCP or a PPP connection.¶
For end-point, [I-D.ietf-schc-over-ppp] describes a type of deployment where the C/D and/or F/R operations are performed between peers of equal capabilities over a PPP [rfc2516] connection. SCHC over PPP illustrates that with SCHC, the protocols that are compressed can be discovered dynamically and the rules can be fetched on-demand using CORECONF messages Rules, ensuring that the peers use the exact same set of rules.¶
+----------+ Wi-Fi / +----------+ ....
| IP | Ethernet | IP | .. )
| Host +-----/------+ Router +----------( Internet )
| SCHC C/D | Serial | SCHC C/D | ( )
+----------+ +----------+ ...
<-- SCHC -->
over PPP
In that case, the SCHC end-point is derived from the PPP connection. This means that there can be only one end-point per PPP connection, and that all the flow and only the flow of that end-point is exchanged within the PPP connection. As discussed in Section 7, the Uplink direction is from the node that initiated the PPP connection to the node that accepted it.¶
Before the SCHC compression takes place, the SCHC Control Header showed in the Figure 12, is virtually inserted before the real protocol header and data that are compressed in the SCHC Instance, e.g. a IPv6 in this figure.¶
<--- SCHC datagram ->
+------------------+------------------+---------+-----------+
| | SCHC | SCHC | uncomp- |
| IEEE 802 Header | Stratum Header | Data | pressed |
| Ethertype = SCHC | Ethertype = IPv6 | Header | payload |
+------------------+------------------+---------+-----------+
<-
SCHC overhead
->
In the case of IPv6, the expectation is that the Upper Layer Protocol (ULP) checksum can be elided in the SCHC compression of the ULP, because the SCHC Control Header may have its own checksum that protects both the SCHC Control Header and the whole ULP, header and payload.¶
The SCHC Control Header between IPv6 and the ULP is not needed because of the Next Header field on the IPv6 header format.¶
<--- SCHC datagram ->
+-------------+----------------+---------+-----------+
| | SCHC | SCHC | uncomp- |
| IPv6 Header | Stratum Header | Data | pressed |
| NH=SCHC | NH = ULP | Header | payload |
+-------------+----------------+---------+-----------+
<-
SCHC overhead
->
In the air, both the SCHC Control Header and the ULP are compressed. The SCHC Instance endpoints are typically identified by the source and destination IP addresses. If the roles are well-known, then the endpoint information can be elided and deduced from the IP header. If there is only one SCHC Instance, it can be elided as well, otherwise a rule and residue are needed to extract the SCHC Instance ID.¶
When SCHC operates over the Internet, middleboxes may block datagrams with a next header that is SCHC. To avoid that issue, it would be desirable to prepend a UDP header before the SCHC Control Header as shown in figure Figure 14.¶
<--- SCHC datagram ->
+-------------+-------------+----------------+---------+-----------+
| | | SCHC | SCHC | uncomp- |
| IPv6 Header | UDP Header | Stratum Header | Data | pressed |
| NH=UDP | Port = SCHC | NH = ULP | Header | payload |
+-------------+-------------+----------------+---------+-----------+
<-
SCHC overhead
->
~
In that case, the destination port can indicate SCHC as in an header chain, and the source port can indicate the SCHC Instance in which case it can be elided in the compressed form of the SCHC Control Header. The UDP checksum protects both the SCHC Control Header and the whole ULP, so the SCHC and the ULP checksums can both be elided. In other words, in the SCHC over UDP case, the SCHC Control Header can be fully elided, but the datagram must carry the overhead of a full UDP header.¶
Section 3 of [rfc8724] depicts a typical network architecture for an LPWAN network, simplified from that shown in [rfc8376] and reproduced in Figure 15.¶
() () () | () () () () / \ +---------+ () () () () () () / \======| ^ | +-----------+ () () () | | <--|--> | |Application| () () () () / \==========| v |=============| Server | () () () / \ +---------+ +-----------+ Dev RGWs NGW App
Typically, an LPWAN network topology is star-oriented, which means that all datagrams between the same source-destination pair follow the same path from/to a central point. In that model, highly constrained Devices (Dev) exchange information with LPWAN Application Servers (App) through a central Network Gateway (NGW), which can be powered and is typically a lot less constrained than the Devices. Because Devices embed built-in applications, the traffic flows to be compressed are known in advance and the location of the C/D and F/R functions (e.g., at the Dev and NGW), and the associated rules, can be pre provisioned in the system before use.¶
In the context of LPWANs, the expectation is that SCHC rules are associated with a physical device that is deployed in a network. This section describes the actions taken to enable an automatic commissioning of the device in the network.¶
The expectation for the development cycle is that message formats are documented as a data model that is used to generate rules. Several models are possible:¶
In the application model, an interface definition language and binary communication protocol such as Apache Thrift is used, and the parser code includes the SCHC operation. This model imposes that both ends are compiled with the generated structures and linked with generated code that represents the rule operation.¶
In the device model, the rules are generated separately. Only the device-side code is linked with generated code. The Rules are published separately to be used by a generic SCHC engine that operates in a middle box such as a SCHC gateway.¶
In the protocol model, both endpoint generate a datagram format that is imposed by a protocol. In that case, the protocol itself is the source to generate the Rules. Both ends of the SCHC compression are operated in middle boxes, and special attention must be taken to ensure that they operate on the compatible SoR, basically the same major version of the same SoR.¶
Depending on the deployment, the tools that generate the Rules should provide knobs to optimize the SoR, e.g., more rules vs. larger residue.¶
In the device model and in the protocol model, at least one of the endpoints must obtain the SoR dynamically. The expectation is that the SoR are published to a reachable repository and versionned (minor, major). Each SoR should have its own Uniform Resource Names (URN) [RFC8141] and a version.¶
The SoR should be authenticated to ensure that it is genuine, or obtained from a trusted app store. A corrupted SoR may be used for multiple forms of attacks, more in Section 8.¶
The device and the network should mutually authenticate themselves. The autonomic approach [RFC8993] provides a model to achieve this at scale with zero touch, in networks where enough bandwidth and compute are available. In highly constrained networks, one touch is usually necessary to program keys in the devices.¶
The initial handshake between the SCHC endpoints should comprise a capability exchange whereby URN and the version of the SoR are obtained or compared.
SCHC may not be used if both ends can not agree on an URN and a major version.
Manufacturer Usage Descriptions (MUD) [RFC8520] may be used for that purpose in the device model.¶
Upon the handshake, both ends can agree on a SoR, their role when the rules are asymmetrical, and fetch the SoR if necessary. Optionally, a node that fetched a SoR may inform the other end that it is reacy from transmission.¶
URN update without device update (bug fix) FUOTA => new URN => reprovisioning¶
Signal from device/vendor/network admin¶
SCHC is sensitive to the rules that could be abused to form arbitrary long messages or as a form of attack against the C/D and/or F/R functions, say to generate a buffer overflow and either modify the Device or crash it. It is thus critical to ensure that the rules are distributed in a fashion that is protected against tempering, e.g., encrypted and signed.¶
This document has no request to IANA¶
The authors would like to thank (in alphabetic order): Laurent Toutain¶