Softwires (softwire)

Last Modified: 2009-02-11

Additional information is available at tools.ietf.org/wg/softwire

Chair(s):

  • Alain Durand <alain_durand@cable.comcast.com>

  • David Ward <dward@cisco.com>

    Internet Area Director(s):

  • Jari Arkko <jari.arkko@piuha.net>
  • Mark Townsley <townsley@cisco.com>

    Internet Area Advisor:

  • Mark Townsley <townsley@cisco.com>

    Technical Advisor(s):

  • Xing Li <xing@cernet.edu.cn>

    Mailing Lists:

    General Discussion: softwires@ietf.org
    To Subscribe: softwires-request@ietf.org
    In Body: With a subject line: subscribe
    Archive: http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/softwires/current/maillist.html

    Description of Working Group:

    The Softwires Working Group is specifying the standardization of
    discovery, control and encapsulation methods for connecting IPv4
    networks across IPv6 networks and IPv6 networks across IPv4 networks in
    a way that will encourage multiple, inter-operable implementations.

    For various reasons, native IPv4 and/or IPv6 transport may not be
    available in all cases, and there is a need to tunnel IPv4 in IPv6 or
    IPv6 in IPv4 to cross a part of the network which is not IPv4 or IPv6
    capable. The Softwire Problem Statement, RFC 4925, identifies two
    distinct topological scenarios that the WG will provide solutions for,
    "Hubs and Spokes" and "Mesh." In the former case, hosts or "stub"
    networks are attached via individual, point-to-point, IPv4 over IPv6 or
    IPv6 over IPv4 softwires to a centralized Softwire Concentrator. In the
    latter case (Mesh), network islands of one Address Family (IPv4 or IPv6)
    are connected over a network of another Address Family via point to
    multi-point softwires among Address family Border Routers (AFBRs).

    The focus of this WG is to:

    Document the softwire encapsulation and control protocol usage for
    one Address Family (IPv6 or IPv4) over another within the defined
    problem spaces set out in RFC 4925.

    Define "Dual-Stack Lite" which uses softwires and IPv4 NAT functions
    to reduce the amount of Global and RFC 1918 Local IPv4 addressing
    necessary for a Service Provider with an IPv6-enabled network to
    continue delivering IPv4 reachability to its customers.

    The WG will reuse existing technologies as much as possible and
    only when necessary, create additional protocol building blocks.

    For generality, all base SOFTWIRE encapsulation mechanisms should
    support all combinations of IP versions over one other (IPv4 over IPv6,
    IPv6 over IPv4, IPv4 over IPv4, IPv6 over IPv6). IPv4 to IPv6
    translation mechanisms (NAT-PT), new addressing schemes, and block
    address assignments are out of scope. DHCP options developed in this
    group will be reviewed jointly with the DHC WG. BGP and other routing
    and signaling protocols developed in this group will be reviewed jointly
    with the proper working groups and other workings that may take interest
    (e.g. IDR, L3VPN, PIM, LDP, SAAG, etc).

    Goals and Milestones:

    Done  Submit a problem statement to the IESG to be considered as an Informational RFC
    Nov 2008  Submit Mesh softwire encapsulation and control protocol to the IESG to be considered as a Proposed Standard
    Nov 2008  Submit H&S softwire encapsulation and control protocol to the IESG to be considered as a Proposed Standard
    Mar 2009  Submit dual-stack lite to the IESG to be considered as a Proposed Standard. The initial basis for this solution is described in draft-durand-dual-stack-lite-00.txt and draft-droms-softwires-snat-01.txt.
    Dec 2009  Submit softwires MIB to the IESG to be considered as Proposed Standard

    Internet-Drafts:

    Softwire Hub & Spoke Deployment Framework with L2TPv2 (100294 bytes)
    Softwire Security Analysis and Requirements (64756 bytes)
    Softwire Mesh Framework (74373 bytes)
    Advertising IPv4 Network Layer Reachability Information with an IPv6 Next Hop (25044 bytes)
    BGP Traffic Engineering Attribute (10861 bytes)
    BGP Encapsulation SAFI and BGP Tunnel Encapsulation Attribute (31206 bytes)
    BGP IPSec Tunnel Encapsulation Attribute (18256 bytes)
    Load Balancing for Mesh Softwires (11872 bytes)

    Request For Comments:

    Softwire Problem Statement (RFC 4925) (49299 bytes)
    IETF Secretariat - Please send questions, comments, and/or suggestions to ietf-web@ietf.org.

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