One document matched: draft-jiang-msa-00.txt


INTERNET-DRAFT                                                  Jiang Wu
<draft-jiang-msa-00.txt>                                          KTH/IT
Expires: October, 2000                                        April 2000


             Seamless IP Multicast Receiver Mobility Support

Status of this Memo

   This document is an Internet-Draft and is in full conformance with
   all provisions of Section 10 of RFC2026.

   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.

Abstract

   This document specifies protocol enhancements that allow seamless
   IP multicast datagram delivery to mobile nodes in the Internet. In
   order to receive IP multicast datagrams, mobile nodes are not
   required to be identified by their unicast IP addresses. For
   unicast communication using Mobile IP, each mobile node needs to
   have a unicast home address and a care-of address. Following a
   handover to another IP subnet, such a mobile node is able to
   receive IP multicast traffic after exchanging IGMP messages with
   the multicast routers on the currently visiting network. However,
   in the worst case, it takes an unreasonably long time (especially
   with respect to streaming media) to resume receiving multicast IP
   traffic in the visiting network.

   This draft specifies a Mobility Support Agent (MSA) protocol which
   provides a mechanism to help ensure seamless reception of IP
   multicast traffic despite a mobile node handover. This is possible
   because in advance of its handover, a mobile node pre-registers
   with the MSA on the next network to be visited. The MSA acts as a
   proxy for this mobile node and is thus able to set up all the
   necessary states for the seamless delivery of multicast traffic to
   this mobile node.


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Table of Contents


1. Introduction ...................................................    2  
	1.1. New Architectural Entities ...........................    5
	1.2. Terminology ..........................................    5
	1.3. Protocol Overview ....................................    6
	1.4. Message Format .......................................    7
2. Agent Discovery ................................................    8
	2.1. Inter-Agent Advertisement ............................    8
	2.2. Agent-MN Advertisement ...............................    9
	     2.2.1. Neighboring Network Extension .................   10 
	2.3. Agent Solicitation ...................................   10
	     2.3.1. MSA History Extension .........................   10
	2.4. MSA Considerations ...................................   11
	2.5. Mobile Node Considerations ...........................   12
3. Pre-registration ...............................................   12
	3.1. Pre-registration .....................................   12
	3.2. Registration Confirm .................................   13
	3.3. MSA Considerations ...................................   14
	     3.3.1. Visitor Counter ...............................   14
	     3.3.2. Mapping Table .................................   14
	     3.3.3. IGMPv2 Process ................................   15
	     3.3.4. Multicast Routing Process .....................   15
	     3.3.5. Other Services ................................   16
	3.4. Mobile Node Considerations ...........................   16
4. De-registration ................................................   16
5. Security Considerations ........................................   17
6. Performance Measurements .......................................   17
7. Acknowledgments ................................................   18
8. References .....................................................   18
9. Author's Addresses .............................................   19




1. Introduction

   Current IP multicast routing protocols [3, 4, 8] and membership
   management protocols [2, 6] do not require explicit identification
   of a node in the IP layer. A mobile node, is therefore capable of
   receiving IP multicast traffic in a visited network, provided that
   IP multicast routing is available on that network, and that the
   node is provided service. The later aspect is being addressed by
   the AAA work regarding Mobile IP [1, 9]. Because in IP multicast
   traffic the destination addresses are not network specific, the
   mobile node can easily resume receiving IP multicast IP after a
   handover without changing its IP address or even acquiring a
   care-of IP address.





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   In this draft we propose a Mobility Support Agent (MSA)
   architecture to support IP mobility related issues on a IP subnet,
   especially for micro-mobility support. A MSA is a network entity
   that resides on a IP subnet. It provides a set of services to all
   the mobile nodes currently visiting that IP subnet. This approach
   supposes to provide seamless IP handover with little change to the
   current Internet architecture and protocols. The MSA architecture
   is a general purpose architecture. In this draft, however, only IP
   multicast is considered. The MSA protocol described in this draft
   only intends to be used in an environment where multicast is widely
   deployed and the nodes are mobile. Its main goal is to help the
   mobile nodes to make handovers without causing noticeable increases
   in multicast handover latency.


				 Internet
           		----------------------------
		        |     	       	       	   |
                       	|			   |
                     +------+                  +------+
	      +---+  |Router|           +---+  |Router|
	      |MSA|  +------+           |MSA|  +------+
	      +---+     |               +---+      |
	   	|       |                 |        |
       	 ----------------------     ---------------------
	 visiting network	    next network
                            +--+    
                            |MN|  --->
		    	    +--+  

   The figure above shows a typical scenario for a handover
   procedure. A mobile node can take part in multiple multicast
   sessions identified by their multicast IP addresses. When doing a
   handover to the next network, two scenarios are possible for each
   multicast session:

      1.That multicast session is active on the next network, i.e.,
	the corresponding multicast traffic is available on that
	network.

      2.That multicast session is passive on the next network, i.e.,
	the multicast tree is not established yet - hence there is no
	corresponding multicast traffic on that network.

   In the case of active multicast sessions, the mobile node suffers
   little latency receiving the IP multicast traffic after a handover
   - since it is already being delivered to this subnet. However, for
   those passive multicast sessions, IGMP and multicast routing
   protocols must be used to establish the new multicast tree on that
   network. This draft deals with the second scenario, the next
   network is highly possible to be passive in the multicast sessions
   a mobile node is participating in because:


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      1.Pico cells with high capacity and low error rate will be
        popular in the near future as the basic wireless
        infrastructure. The pico cell size is too small to accommodate
        many mobile nodes, hence the probability of their already
        being a member of the multicast group in the cell is small.

      2.Many multicast sessions will be sparse mode sessions, in which
        members are scattered over the Internet. This also reduces the
        probability of having active multicast sessions in the next
        network.

   In this scenario, after a handover to the next network, the mobile
   node waits for an new IGMP Membership Query. It is this message
   that triggers the mobile node to send an IGMP Membership Report to
   the multicast routers. However, this will probably result in a big
   traffic gap in receiving, since the average waiting time for an
   IGMP Membership Query by a mobile node after a handover is around
   half of the IGMP Query Membership Interval. In typical
   implementations, the IGMP Query Membership Interval usually is 60
   or 120 seconds, resulting in 30 or 60 seconds of average handover
   latency. In the following text, we use "handover latency" to
   indicate the traffic gap (in time domain) a mobile node suffers
   during a handover.

   Once the mobile node receives an IGMP Membership Query, it sets a
   delay timer for each group. Each timer is set to a different random
   value between 0 and Max Response Time. It is after this timer's
   expiration that the mobile node sends an IGMP Membership Report to
   the multicast routers, which in turn start to establish the
   multicast tree. The handover latency introduced by the back off
   sending IGMP Membership Report is on average half of the Max
   Response Time. In typical implementations, the Max Response Time is
   10 seconds, resulting in 5 seconds of average handover latency.

   Besides the latency introduced by IGMP process, the mobile node
   also needs to establish the multicast tree to the up-streaming
   routers. The tree establishing procedure is started right after the
   multicast routers receiving the IGMP Membership Report, which
   introduces additional latency in the handover. The tree
   establishing latency depends on the distance between the leaf
   multicast router and the closest up-streaming router, and the
   current situation of the networks. This latency is short in many
   cases (in the magnitude order of several tens of milliseconds), so
   that it is insignificant when compared with the potential latency
   introduced by IGMP. However, the tree establishing latency is not
   negligible when the distance to the up-streaming router is very
   long or the networks are instable.

   Looking a little closer, the situation after the handover is
   similar to when a multicast application first starts running in the
   mobile node - in this case the application triggers the IGMP to
   emit an unsolicited IGMP Membership Report, which eliminates the


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   start up latency by allowing the mobile node to report its presence
   without waiting for the IGMP Membership Query. The remaining
   latency only results from the tree establishing procedure.

   However, in the current Internet, neither the multicast
   applications nor IGMP has the mechanism to detect the handover and
   trigger the unsolicited IGMP Membership Report. The potential
   handover latency for a mobile node thus is very long in receiving
   IP multicast traffic [see section 6].

1.1. New Architecture Entities

   The MSA protocol introduces the following new architectural
   entities:

      Mobile Node

	   A host that changes its point of attachment from one
	   network or subnetwork to another.

      Mobility Support Agent

	   An agent on a network which acts as a proxy for mobile
	   nodes (that potential might come to this network) to
	   establish the multicast tree in advance of the mobile
	   nodes' arrival. In addition, this agent can also be used to
	   advertise the services available on its subnet to the
	   mobile nodes.

1.2. Terminology

   The terminology used in this draft mostly is the same as used in
   Mobile IP. The different/additional definitions used in this draft
   are:

      Visiting network
	  The IP subnet that the mobile node is currently visiting.

      Neighboring network
       	  An IP subnet that is geographically a neighbor of the
       	  visiting IP subnet.

      Next network (to be visited)
	  The IP subnet that that the mobile node will be connected to
	  (i.e., to which it handsover).

      Previous network - i.e., Previously visited network
          The IP subnet that the mobile node has just visited.






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1.3. Protocol Overview

   The following protocols are defined for IP multicast mobility
   support:

      Agent Discovery

         The MSAs may advertise their availability and the services
	 they provide for their subnet. A mobile node utilizes these
	 advertisement and makes a handover accordingly. Agent
	 Discovery consists of two parts: Inter-Agent Advertisement
	 among the MSAs and the Agent-MN Advertisement between the
	 mobile node and its directly attached MSA.

      Pre-registration

         In advance of the handover, the mobile node pre-registers
         with the MSA on the next network. Based on this
         pre-registration the MSA establishes the multicast tree and
         negotiates for services (as a proxy of the mobile node).

      De-registration

         After moving to another network, a mobile node de-registers
         with the MSA on the previous network. De-registration
         explicitly removes stale states which might otherwise lead to
         unnecessary traffic being sent to the previous network.

   The following steps provide a rough outline of the operation of the
   MSA protocol:

   -  MSAs advertise their presence and services (bandwidth
      reservation, authentication, etc.) via Agent Advertisements. A
      mobile node may optionally solicit an Agent Advertisement from
      any locally attached MSAs through an Agent Solicitation.

   -  A mobile node about to make a handover chooses one or more
      most-likely next network (perhaps via a movement prediction
      algorithm) and sends Pre-registration(s) to the MSA on the
      potential next network(s).

   -  After authentication and following negotiation between the mobile
      node and each of these MSAs, these MSAs can now act as a proxy
      for the mobile node in setting up the requested multicast
      sessions. IGMP messages are exchanged between the MSA and its
      directly attached multicast routers.

   -  As soon as the mobile node arrives at the next network, it
      resumes receiving the IP multicast traffic with the minimum
      possible latency, since the join occurred even before it
      arrived.



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   -  Once confirmed that it is successfully receiving IP multicast
      traffic, the mobile node sends De-registrations to the MSA on
      the preciously visited network. If this mobile node was the last
      mobile member in a multicast group on the previous network, the
      MSA sends a IGMPv2 Leave Group message for that specific
      multicast group.

1.4. Message Format

   The MSA protocol messages are quite similar to the Mobile IP
   message format. One reason is that both are tackling the IP
   mobility problem, so that the MSA can be integrated with Mobile IP
   agents in one unit. Another reason is that Mobile IP protocol
   messages provide a flexible way to make protocol extensions.

   The MSA protocol defines several new control messages:

       Pre-registration
       De-registration

	 They are sent with UDP [7] using the well-known port number
	 434, the same port number used for Mobile IP Registration
	 Request/Reply messages.

      Inter-Agent Advertisement

	 Inter-Agent Advertisement has its own message format. It uses
	 multicast datagrams instead of unicast datagrams. The
	 involved MSAs are allocated a dedicated multicast group, to
	 which all MSAs are both senders and receivers.

   MSA protocol defines a general Extension mechanism to allow
   optional information to be carried by MSA control messages or by
   ICMP Router Discovery messages [5] (just as in Mobile IP).  Each of
   these Extensions is encoded in the following Type-Length-Value
   format:

    0                   1                   2
    0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
   |     Type      |    Length     |    Data ...
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-

      Type     	Indicates the particular type of Extension.

      Length 	Indicates the length (in bytes) of the data field
		within this Extension. The length does NOT include the
		Type and Length bytes.






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      Data 	The particular data associated with this Extension.
		This field may be zero or more bytes in length. The
		format and length of the data field are determined by
		the type and length fields.

   The extension messages are:

      Those appearing in the ICMP Router Discovery message

	 Agent-MN Advertisement Extension
	 Registration Confirm Extension
	 MN History Extension

      Those appearing in the MSA protocol control message

	 MN Authentication Extension

2. Agent Discovery

   The Agent Discovery protocol is used to advertise the presence of
   MSAs and their services. Unlike Mobile IP, mobile nodes do not use
   MSA Agent Discovery protocol to determine its current location or
   to detect the node's movement. For the MSA architecture, movement
   detection can either be performed with the help of Mobile IP or by
   using link layer mechanisms. Because a mobile node wants to
   (quickly) use the services on its next network, movement prediction
   is a very important part of the MSA architecture. In this draft,
   however, we do not specify the way to do movement prediction.

2.1. Inter-Agent Advertisement

   A group of cooperating MSAs form their own multicast group to
   advertise their availability and services to each other. The
   Inter-Agent Advertisements are not directly received by the mobile
   nodes. The address of the multicast group can either be a
   administrative multicast address or other pre-defined addresses.

   The most important field within a Inter-Agent Advertisement is the
   MSA's unicast IP address. Using this address a mobile node can
   pre-register. Inter-Agent Advertisement can also advertise the
   services that the local MSA provides and the current link situation
   of the local network. These are done by using the extensions.

   IP fields:

      Source Address
	       Typically the MSA interface address from which the
               message is sent.

      Destination Address
	       The multicast address for the MSA group.



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   UDP fields:

      Source Port	variable

      Destination Port	TBN	

   The UDP header is followed by the advertisement fields shown below:

    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
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |    Lifetime                   |        Sequence Number        |
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |NetType|A|R|   Reserved	   |   Current Free Bandwidth      |
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |   	      Zero or more Neighboring MSA Addresses 	           |
   |   		             	...				   |

      Lifetime
	       The valid time period for a Inter-Agent Advertisement,
	       measured in seconds.

      Sequence Number
	       The count of Agent Advertisement messages sent since the
               agent was initialized.

      NetType	The link layer network that the MSA is attached to,
		for instance, WLAN (1), Ethernet (2), GPRS (3), etc.

      A		Authentication required.

      R		Resource reservation available.

      Reserved	For future extension.

      Current Free Bandwidth	        
		The estimated spare bandwidth available (in kbps) in
	        the network, used for adaptive applications, e.g.,
	        layered multicast applications.

      Neighboring MSA address
		Unicast IP address of neighboring MSA's.

2.2. Agent-MN advertisement

   The Agent-MN advertisement makes use of the Mobile IP Agent
   Advertisement Extensions of the ICMP Router
   Advertisement. Advertisement messages are transmitted by a MSA to
   the mobile nodes which are on the same network. The information
   advertised by the MSA is either directly retrieved from the
   Inter-agent Discovery messages, or derived from them.  Within an
   Agent Advertisement message, ICMP Router Advertisement fields of
   the message have the same requirements as in Mobile IP.

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2.2.1. Neighboring Network Extension

    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
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |    Type       |    Length     |    Sequence Number            |
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |   		            MSA Address 1 	                   |
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |NetType|A|R|	           |	Current Free Bandwidth	   |
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |   		               ...        	                   |
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |   		            MSA Address n 	                   |
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |NetType|A|R|	           |	Current Free Bandwidth	   |
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+

      Type      TBN

      Length	(2+4*N), where N is the number of MSA addresses
	        advertised.

      Sequence Number
	        The count of Agent Advertisement messages sent
	        since the agent was initialized

      MSA Address n
		The neighboring MSA's unicast IP address to which a
		mobile node can send pre-registration requests to.

2.3. Agent Solicitation

   Mobile nodes may send an Agent Solicitation message when moving to
   the next network. An Agent Solicitation uses the ICMP Router
   Solicitation with the IP TTL set to 1.

2.3.1. MSA History Extension

   In the MSA History Extension, the mobile node records the most
   recently visited MSAs in reverse sequence. The current serving MSA
   can determine its neighboring peers from the history list.












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    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
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |    Type       |    Length     |O 1|O 2|O 3|O 4|O 5|O 6|O 7|O 8|
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |   			  Visited MSA 1                            |
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |       Timestamp in 1          |	Timestamp out 1            |
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |                         ...                                   |
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |                      Visited MSA n                            |
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |       Timestamp in n          |	Timestamp out n            |
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+

      Type	TBN

      Length	(2+4*N)

      O n	Optionally records the overlap status between the
		network n and network (n-1). Possible values are: 0
		non-overlap, 1 partial overlap, 2 full overlap.
      Visited MSA n
	        The MSA that has been visited by the mobile node, 1 is
	        the most recently visited, while n is the MSA visited
	        n hops back.

      Timestamp in/out n
		The time (in seconds) when the mobile node first
		receives an Agent advertisement (in), and the time
		when the mobile node sends a Pre-registration (out).

2.4. MSA considerations

   Every MSA must send Agent advertisements. However, it must limit
   the rate at which it sends broadcast or multicast Agent
   Advertisements. A recommended maximum rate is once per second.

   For Inter-Agent Advertisement, all the involved MSAs must be both
   senders and receivers. To avoid synchronization of the
   advertisement messages, sending to the multicast group should be
   randomized in time.

   Each MSA keeps a table including a list of peer MSAs serving their
   own network and their corresponding services and information. By
   collecting the MSA History Extensions, MSAs are able to work out a
   map of the network topology with MSA services. If MSA is deployed
   on each network, full geographic topology of the networks can be
   revealed. This map can optionally be advertised to the mobile nodes
   for aiding movement prediction. The detailed operation is not
   discussed in this draft.


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2.5. Mobile Nodes Considerations

   In order to take advantage of the MSAs, mobile nodes may process
   received Agent Advertisements.  They may report their MSA history
   list by sending MSA History Extensions. There might be loops in the
   history list. Mobile nodes can use this information and the
   timestamps together with the map information to analyze the user's
   movement behavior, which aids movement prediction.

   In the MSA History Extension, the information of whether the
   neighboring networks are overlapped or not is optional. One
   straight forward mechanism possibly can be used is for the mobile
   node to monitor all the network interfaces. If the mobile node can
   hear simultaneously signals from the neighboring networks, it can
   assume the networks are overlapped. Multiple wireless interfaces
   are needed and required to monitor the channels when the
   neighboring networks are heterogeneous.

3. Pre-registration

   Pre-registration is the key method for a mobile node to enable
   seamless handover relative to multicast. By pre-registration, a
   mobile node can:

	- Negotiate services on the next network.

	- Request that the corresponding MSA set up services in
	  advance; in the case of multicast, the MSA helps to set up
	  the multicast tree.

   Pre-registration has one new control message type:

   Pre-registration  
          The MSAs use the UDP port 434 for listening to the
          Pre-registrations. For each multicast group, the MSA creates
          an entry in its mobile multicast table.

   The reason to use the same well-known UDP port as Mobile IP
   registration is that the MSA can also act as a Mobile IP Home Agent
   or Foreign Agent. It can also be used for pre-registration for IP
   unicast (which is not developed further in this draft).

3.1. Pre-registration

   A mobile node sends a pre-registration to the MSA on the next
   network before it makes a handover. This message contains a
   timestamp and all the multicast groups that are currently active in
   the mobile node. Pre-registration does not require feedback from
   the MSA, because the mobile node might have left the current
   visiting network before the feedback is available. In order to
   improve reliability, the mobile node is required to send the same
   pre-registration 3 times.


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   IP fields:

      Source Address
	       Typically the mobile node interface address (a unicast
	       IP address) from which the message is sent.

      Destination Address
	       The unicast address of the MSA on the next network.

   UDP fields:

      Source Port	variable

      Destination Port	434

   The UDP header is followed by the Mobile IP fields shown below:

    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
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |     Type      |  Reserved     |       Lifetime                |
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |   	           One or more Multicast Address(es)               |
   |				...				   |

      Type	TBN

      Reserved	For future use.

      Lifetime
	       The number of seconds remaining before the registration
               is considered expired.

      Multicast Addresses
	       The multicast address for each group that the mobile node is
	       participating as receiver.

3.2. Registration Confirm Extension

   Once the MSA receives a pre-registration, it initiates the process
   to establish the corresponding multicast tree. At the same time it
   checks if the multicast group in the message is present on the
   local network. If not, it will setup a timer which has the value of
   "Lifetime" in the Pre-registration message. During the "Lifetime"
   period, the MSA waits for a Registration Confirm from the mobile
   node. The mobile node sends the Registration Confirm to the MSA
   only after it has moved to the next network and successfully
   received the first multicast datagram. After receiving the
   Registration Confirm, the MSA stop the timer and send a
   De-registration to the MSA on the previous network. The way to find
   out the previous network is by looking for the mobile node's
   identity and its MSA history list.


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   The Registration Confirm Extension makes use of the ICMP Router
   Solicitation Extension:

    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
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |    Type       |    Length     |                               |
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |			    Previous MSA			   |
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |		   One or more multicast address	           |
   |   		             	...				   |

      Type	TBN

      Length	(2+4*N)

      Previous MSA
	        The MSA on the previous network that the
	        De-registration message will be sent to.

      Multicast Address
	        The multicast address that the mobile node is
	        currently participating as receiver.

3.3. MSA considerations

3.3.1. Visitor Counter

   A MSA maintains a visitor counter for each multicast group that are
   pre-registered by the mobile nodes. The counter records the number
   of mobile nodes on the network are receiving the corresponding
   multicast group. The counter increases by one every time the MSA
   receives a Registration Confirm for that multicast group, decreases
   by one when the MSA receives a De-registration for that multicast
   group. A counter is created when the MSA receives the first
   Pre-registration for that multicast group. But the counter number
   is not initialized until the MSA receives the first Registration
   Confirm. If the timer set by the MSA for Registration Confirm
   expires, the counter is removed.

3.3.2. Mapping Table

   Every MSA maintains a Mapping Table to reveal the relations among
   the MSA enabled networks. The mapping information either comes from
   the mobile node's MSA History Extension or by manual configuration
   when the MSAs are setup. The MSAs exchange the information with
   each other via the Inter-Agent Advertisement, thus every MSA can
   compute the full map on its own.





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   A Mapping Table has following format:

   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   | Peer MSA Address   | HopCount |  Overlap | Services           |
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |  130.237.216.146   |    3     |   0      | AR                 |
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |  130.237.15.178    |    0     |   1      | A                  |
   |     ...            |   ...    |  ...     |    ...             |

      Peer MSA Address
	  Normally the unicast IP address the peer MSA uses for
	  receiving the Pre-registrations.

      HopCount
	  It indicates how many networks away the peer MSA is. When
	  the MSAs are not fully deployed in the networks, the
	  HopCount is only meaningful for those networks with MSA.

      Overlap
          HopCount value 0 indicates the network served by the peer
          MSA and the local networks are overlapped. Overlap 1
          indicates they are partially overlapped.

      Services
          The services that the peer MSA provides, it has the same
          convention as in the Inter-Agent Advertisement.

3.3.3. IGMPv2 Process

   On the MSA's directly attached network, the MSA acts as an
   individual IGMP entity as the other nodes do on the network. To the
   registering mobile nodes, the MSA functions as the IGMP proxy. The
   MSA should immediately transmit an unsolicited Membership Report
   for that group when a new Visitor Counter is initialized for a
   multicast group. It should send a Leave Group message to the
   all-routers multicast group (224.0.0.2) when a multicast group
   entry is removed.

   The MSA is only responsible for establishing the multicast tree if
   it is not already done for the pre-registered mobile nodes. Once a
   mobile node is on the MSA's directly attached network, IGMP
   messages are exchanged in the normal way between the mobile host
   and the multicast routers.

3.3.4. Multicast Routing Protocol Process

   Once the IGMP process in a multicast router receives a membership
   report for a new group, it will notify the multicast router to add
   a routing entry for the corresponding multicast group in its
   routing table. Usually the multicast router immediately start the
   tree establishing process. It sends a "join/prune" message (in PIM)


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   or "graft" message (in DVMRP) to their up-streaming routers. The
   latency in this process is introduced by the processing time and
   propagation delay. This latency normally is not much, however, when
   the up-streaming multicast router is geographically far away or the
   networks are not stable, the propagation delay would be
   significant.

3.3.5. Other Services

   Other services may be available as options in the MSA. All these
   services may use the extensions of Pre-registration to negotiate
   and use extensions of Inter-Agent Advertisement to advertise. One
   of these services is that the MSA can buffer some multicast packets
   for the coming mobile node if it is asked by that mobile
   node. Another is that MSA acts as a multicast router on the local
   network which establishes tunnels with other MSAs or multicast
   Routers. These services are not parts of this draft specification.

3.4. Mobile Nodes Considerations

   A mobile node sends Pre-registrations via UDP datagram with the
   destination port 434, the destination IP address is the MSA on the
   next network. It listens to the ICMP Router Advertisement to
   determine the default router. No feedback is needed in the
   Pre-registration protocol. In addition, authentication can use the
   extension mechanism as done in Mobile IP.

   It is quite possible that after a mobile node sends one or more
   Pre-registrations to the MSA on the next network, it does not
   handover to that network. Without receiving a Registration Confirm
   during the "Lifetime" period (specified in the Pre-registration),
   the MSA will "prune" the multicast tree if there are no other
   members on its local network. The mobile node must not trigger
   another pre-registration process within the "Lifetime"
   period. After the "Lifetime" interval, it may do a pre-registration
   according to the new situation and the movement prediction
   mechanisms.

4. De-registration

   De-registration is used for de-registering with the MSA on the
   previous network. When the Visitor Counter for a multicast group
   reaches 0, the MSA acting as an ordinary IGMP entity sends an IGMP
   Leave Group message for that multicast group too the multicast
   routers. This procedure eliminates the IGMP leaving latency on the
   previous network if there are no fixed members on the previous
   network.

   IP fields:

      Source Address
	       Typically the mobile node interface address (a unicast
	       IP address) from which the message is sent.

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      Destination Address
	       The MSA on the previous network.

   UDP fields:

      Source Port	variable

      Destination Port	434

   The UDP header is followed by the Mobile IP fields shown below:

    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
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |     Type      |              Reserved                         |
   +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
   |   		    One or more Multicast Address                  |
   |				...				   |

      Type	TBN

      Reserved	For future use.

      Multicast Address
	       The multicast group that the mobile node has
	       participated as receiver on the previous network.

      De-registration uses UDP and does not require the feed back, the
      mobile node should send De-registration 3 times in sequence.

5. Security Considerations

   The major security attacks may come from:

      1.The forged Inter-Agent advertisements may prevent the mobile
        nodes from knowing the correct network situation, which will
        lead to wrong handover decisions.

      2.The forged Pre-registrations or De-registrations may trigger
        the MSAs to establish or tear down the multicast tree
        improperly. Too many such messages may overload a MSA.
   
   These attacks can be to large extend avoided by using
   authentication among the MSAs and mobile nodes.

6. Performance Measurements

   We have simply implemented the protocol in our own
   testbed. Measurements have been made to test how much handover
   performance regarding to handover latency can be improved by using
   pre-registration in with the MSA architecture. IGMPv2 and PIM-SM
   are used in the testbed, with IGMP Membership Query Interval


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   configured to 60 seconds and Max Response Time configured to 10
   seconds. Results show that without pre-registration the average
   handover latency is around 32 seconds, in which 27 seconds due to
   IGMP Membership Query waiting, 5 seconds due to the random back off
   in sending IGMP Membership Report. In our testbed, the closest
   up-streaming multicast router is always close to the leaf multicast
   router and the networks are stable, so the tree establishing
   latency is only around several tens of milliseconds.

   By using pre-registration with MSA, all the IGMP and tree
   establishing processes are done in advance of the mobile node's
   handover. Our measurements show that the major latency is from the
   physical movement. Since we used a SNMP controlled multi-segment
   10BT Ethernet hub to emulate the handover, the physical movement
   latency is around several milliseconds.

7. Acknowledgments

   A lot of thanks to Chip Maguire, Bjorn Pehrson, and J-O Vatn for
   the discussions and comments on this draft.

8. References

   [1] C. Perkins, "IP Mobility Support", RFC 2002, October 1996.

   [2] W. Fenner, "Internet Group Management Protocol, Version 2", RFC
       2236, November 1997.

   [3] Estrin, et. al., "Protocol Independent Multicast-Sparse Mode
       (PIM-SM): Protocol Specification", RFC 2362, June 1998.

   [4] Waitzman, Partridge & Deering, "Distance Vector Multicast
       Routing Protocol", RFC 1075, November 1998.

   [5] Deering, S., Editor, "ICMP Router Discovery Messages",
       RFC 1256, September 1991.

   [6] Deering, S., "Host Extensions for IP Multicasting", STD 5,
       RFC 1112, August 1989.

   [7] Postel, J., "User Datagram Protocol", STD 6, RFC 768, August
       1980.

   [8] J. Moy, "Multicast Extensions to OSPF", RFC 1584, March 1994.

   [9] S. Glass, S. Jacobs, C. Perkins, "Mobile IP authentication,
       authorization, and accounting requirements",
       draft-ietf-mobileip-aaa-reqs-00.txt, October 1999.






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9. Authors' Addresses

Contact Information

   Jiang Wu
   KTH/IT, Electrum 204
   S-16440 Kista, Sweden

   Tel  : +46 8 752 1484
   Fax  : +46 8 751 1793
   Email: jiang@it.kth.se 











































Jiang                                                          [Page 19]

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