Internet-Draft enhanced-alternate-marking August 2022
Zhou, Ed., et al. Expires 2 March 2023 [Page]
Workgroup:
IPPM
Internet-Draft:
draft-zhou-ippm-enhanced-alternate-marking-10
Published:
Intended Status:
Standards Track
Expires:
Authors:
T. Zhou, Ed.
Huawei
G. Fioccola
Huawei
M. Cociglio
Telecom Italia
Y. Liu
China Mobile
S. Lee
LG U+
W. Li
Huawei

Enhanced Alternate Marking Method

Abstract

This document extends the IPv6 Alternate Marking Option to provide enhanced capabilities and allow advanced functionalities. With this extension, it can be possible to perform thicker packet loss measurements and more dense delay measurements with no limitation for the number of concurrent flows under monitoring.

Status of This Memo

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

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

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This Internet-Draft will expire on 2 March 2023.

Table of Contents

1. Introduction

The Alternate Marking [RFC8321] and Multipoint Alternate Marking [RFC8889] define the Alternate Marking technique that is a hybrid performance measurement method, per [RFC7799] classification of measurement methods. This method is based on marking consecutive batches of packets and it can be used to measure packet loss, latency, and jitter on live traffic.

The IPv6 AltMark Option [I-D.ietf-6man-ipv6-alt-mark] applies the Alternate Marking Method to IPv6, and defines an Extension Header Option to encode the Alternate Marking Method for both the Hop-by-Hop Options Header and the Destination Options Header. Similarly, SRv6 AltMark [I-D.fz-spring-srv6-alt-mark] defines how Alternate Marking data is carried as a TLV in the Segment Routing Header.

While the IPv6 AltMark Option implements the basic alternate marking methodology, this document defines extended data fields for the AltMark Option and provides enhanced capabilities to overcome some challenges and enable future proof applications.

It is worth mentioning that the enhanced capabilities are intended for further use and are optional.

Some possible enhanced applications MAY be:

  1. thicker packet loss measurements: the single marking method of the base AltMark Option can be extended with additional marking bits in order to get shortest marking periods under the same timing conditions.
  2. more dense delay measurements: than double marking method of the base AltMark Option can be extended with additional marking bits in order to identify down to each packet as delay sample.
  3. increase the number of concurrent flows under monitoring: if the 20-bit FlowMonID is set independently and pseudo randomly, there is a 50% chance of collision for 1206 flows. The size of FlowMonIDcan can be extended to raise the entropy and therefore to increase the number of concurrent flows that can be monitored.

1.1. Requirements Language

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.

2. Data Fields Format

The Data Fields format is represented in Figure 1. An 4-bit NH(NextHeader) field is allocated from the Reserved field of IPv6 AltMark Option [I-D.ietf-6man-ipv6-alt-mark]. It is worth highlighting that remaining bits of the former Reserved field continue to be reserved.

 0                   1                   2                   3
 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
+---------------------------------------+-+-+-----------+-------+
|           FlowMonID                   |L|D|  Reserved |  NH   |
+---------------------------------------+-+-+-----------+-------+

Figure 1: Figure 1: Data fields indicator for enhanced capabilities

The NH (NextHeader) field is used to indicate the extended data fields which are used for enhanced capabilities:

 0                   1                   2                   3
 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
+---------------------------------------+-------+-------+-------+
|           FlowMonID Ext               | Flag  |  Len  |   R   |
+-------------------------------+-------+-------+-------+-------+
|           MetaInfo            |      Padding (variable)       |
+-------------------------------+-------------------------------+
//                    Padding (variable)                       //
+-------------------------------+-------------------------------+
Figure 2: Figure 2: Data fields extension for enhanced alternate marking

where:

The Flag is defined in Figure 3 as:

 0 1 2 3
+-------+
|M|R|F|R|
+-------+
Figure 3: Figure 3: Flag data field

The MetaInfo is defined in Figure 4 as a bit map as follows:

 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
+---------------+
|    MetaInfo   |
+---------------+
Figure 4: Figure 4: MetaInfo data field

It is worth noting that the meta data information specified above in Figure 5, Figure 6 and Figure 7 must be ordered according to the order of the MetaInfo bits.

3. Security Considerations

IPv6 AltMark Option [I-D.ietf-6man-ipv6-alt-mark] analyzes different security concerns and related solutions. These aspects are valid and applicable also to this document. In particular the fundamental security requirement is that Alternate Marking MUST only be applied in a specific limited domain, as also mentioned in [RFC8799].

4. IANA Considerations

This document has no request to IANA.

5. References

5.1. Normative References

[I-D.fz-spring-srv6-alt-mark]
Fioccola, G., Zhou, T., and M. Cociglio, "Segment Routing Header encapsulation for Alternate Marking Method", Work in Progress, Internet-Draft, draft-fz-spring-srv6-alt-mark-03, , <https://datatracker.ietf.org/api/v1/doc/document/draft-fz-spring-srv6-alt-mark/>.
[I-D.ietf-6man-ipv6-alt-mark]
Fioccola, G., Zhou, T., Cociglio, M., Qin, F., and R. Pang, "IPv6 Application of the Alternate Marking Method", Work in Progress, Internet-Draft, draft-ietf-6man-ipv6-alt-mark-16, , <https://datatracker.ietf.org/api/v1/doc/document/draft-ietf-6man-ipv6-alt-mark/>.
[RFC2119]
Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, DOI 10.17487/RFC2119, , <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc2119>.
[RFC7799]
Morton, A., "Active and Passive Metrics and Methods (with Hybrid Types In-Between)", RFC 7799, DOI 10.17487/RFC7799, , <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc7799>.
[RFC8174]
Leiba, B., "Ambiguity of Uppercase vs Lowercase in RFC 2119 Key Words", BCP 14, RFC 8174, DOI 10.17487/RFC8174, , <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc8174>.

5.2. Informative References

[RFC8321]
Fioccola, G., Ed., Capello, A., Cociglio, M., Castaldelli, L., Chen, M., Zheng, L., Mirsky, G., and T. Mizrahi, "Alternate-Marking Method for Passive and Hybrid Performance Monitoring", RFC 8321, DOI 10.17487/RFC8321, , <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc8321>.
[RFC8799]
Carpenter, B. and B. Liu, "Limited Domains and Internet Protocols", RFC 8799, DOI 10.17487/RFC8799, , <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc8799>.
[RFC8889]
Fioccola, G., Ed., Cociglio, M., Sapio, A., and R. Sisto, "Multipoint Alternate-Marking Method for Passive and Hybrid Performance Monitoring", RFC 8889, DOI 10.17487/RFC8889, , <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc8889>.

Authors' Addresses

Tianran Zhou
Huawei
156 Beiqing Rd.
Beijing
100095
China
Giuseppe Fioccola
Huawei
Riesstrasse, 25
80992 Munich
Germany
Mauro Cociglio
Telecom Italia
Via Reiss Romoli, 274
10148 Torino
Italy
Yisong Liu
China Mobile
Beijing
China
Shinyoung Lee
LG U+
71, Magokjungang 8-ro, Gangseo-gu
Seoul
Republic of Korea
Weidong Li
Huawei
156 Beiqing Rd.
Beijing
100095
China