IP Telephony (iptel)

NOTE: This charter is a snapshot of the . It may now be out-of-date.
In addition to this official charter maintained by the IETF Secretariat, there is additional information about this working group on the Web at:

       Additional IPTEL Page

Last Modified: 2004-11-02

Chair(s):

Jonathan Rosenberg <jdrosen@cisco.com>
Cullen Jennings <fluffy@cisco.com>

Transport Area Director(s):

Allison Mankin <mankin@psg.com>
Jon Peterson <jon.peterson@neustar.biz>

Transport Area Advisor:

Jon Peterson <jon.peterson@neustar.biz>

Mailing Lists:

General Discussion: iptel@ietf.org
To Subscribe: iptel-request@ietf.org
In Body: put subscribe in subject
Archive: http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/iptel/index.html

Description of Working Group:

The focus of the IP Telephony (iptel) group is on the problems related
to naming and routing for Voice over IP (VoIP) protocols.
Naming is accomplished through the use of the tel URI, which specifies
a URI for telephone numbers. The tel URI was originally defined in RFC
2806, which was developed outside of any IETF working group. The iptel
working group is responsible for updating the specification based on
extensive experience with the tel URI. It is chartered to develop any
extensions to the tel URI, such as support for number portability
indicators and trunk groups.

Routing protocols for VoIP allow intermediaries, such as SIP proxies
and H.323 gatekeepers, to make call routing decisions based on
reachability information learned from peer elements. The iptel group
has already defined a protocol, Telephony Routing over IP (TRIP), RFC
3219, which solves one aspect of this problem. Specifically, it handles
the case where calls need to be routed between domains. It allows for
the exchange of routing information between these providers, so that
policies can be applied to the resulting data to create a forwarding
information base.

However, this protocol does not address all the scenarios of route
information exchange between servers. One important scenario is the
propagation of routing information between gateways and the signaling
servers in front of them. This is also known as "gateway registration".
It allows the signaling server to make a routing decision about which
gateway to use based on dynamic information about the gateway
resources. Vendors have deployed proprietary solutions for this
communications interface. A standard is needed. The group will generate
a standards track document that defines a protocol (possibly based on
TRIP) for this interface.

TRIP and the gateway registration protocol are orthogonal to the
DNS-based mechanisms specified in ENUM and RFC 3264. Those mechanisms
are used to translate a URI, representing a name, to an address. If
that address is a phone number in the telephone network, trip and tgrep
can be used to assist in determining the right route (through various
gateways) to that number.

The group will also generate a MIB document for TRIP.

Note that the group is not working on elevating TRIP to Draft Standard
at this time.

Deliverables:

1. A proposed standard specification for gateway to server route
exchange.

2. A proposed standard TRIP MIB specification, based heavily on the
existing BGP-4 MIB documents.

3. A standards track update to the tel URI.

4. Standards track extensions to the tel URI for PSTN interoperability,
such as number portability and trunk group identification.

Goals and Milestones:

Done  Submit gateway location framework document to IESG for consideration as an RFC.
Done  Submit call processing syntax framework document to IESG for consideration as an RFC.
Done  Submit call processing syntax document to IESG for consideration as a Proposed Standard.
Done  Submit gateway location protocol document to IESG for consideration as an RFC.
Done  TRIP MIB Document submitted to IESG for consideration as proposed standard
Jun 2003  Gateway to Server Route Exchange document submitted to IESG for consideration as proposed standard.
Jul 2003  Tel URI revisions submitted to IESG
Sep 2003  Number portability extensions submitted to IESG for consideration as proposed standard
Nov 2003  Consider closing

Internet-Drafts:

  • draft-ietf-iptel-tgrep-06.txt
  • draft-ietf-iptel-trunk-group-04.txt
  • draft-ietf-iptel-tel-np-07.txt

    Request For Comments:

    RFCStatusTitle
    RFC2824 I Call Processing Language Framework and Requirements
    RFC2871 I A Framework for a Gateway Location Protocol
    RFC3219 PS Telephony Routing over IP (TRIP)
    RFC3872 Standard Management Information Base for Telephony Routing over IP (TRIP)
    RFC3880 Standard CPL: A Language for User Control of Internet Telephony Services
    RFC3966 Standard The tel URI for Telephone Numbers