[dtn] Draft charter for review

["Templin, Fred L" <[e-mail]>]

Hello,

Please see below for a revised draft charter for public review.
Please send comments to the list so that we may have an open
discussion.

Thanks - Fred
[e-mail]

Draft working group charter:
****************************
Working group name: 

      Delay/Disruption Tolerant Networking Working Group (DTNWG)

Chair(s):

      TBD

Area and Area Director(s):

      Transport Area: ADs Spencer Dawkins <spencerdawkins.ietf at gmail.com>,
                          Martin Stiemerling <mls.ietf at gmail.com>

Responsible Area Director:

      Martin Steimerling <mls.ietf at gmail.com>

Mailing list:

      General Discussion: dtn at ietf.org
      To Subscribe: https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/dtn
      Archive: http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/dtn/current/maillist.html

Description of Working Group:

      The Delay/Disruption Tolerant Network Working Group (DTNWG) specifies
      mechanisms for data communications in the presence of long delays
      and/or intermittent connectivity. The work is motivated by well known
      limitations of standard Internet protocols that expect end-to-end
      connectivity between communicating endpoints, sub-second transmission
      delays and robust packet delivery ratios. In environments where these
      favorable conditions do not apply, existing mechanisms encounter problems 
      such as reliable transport protocol handshakes timing out and routing 
      protocols failing to converge resulting in communication failures. 
      Furthermore, classical end-to-end security associations cannot be 
      coordinated when communicating endpoints cannot conduct multi-message 
      keying exchanges in a timely fashion. These limitations suggested the 
      need for a new approach. 
      
      Delay-Tolerant Networking (DTN) protocols have been the subject of
      extensive research and development in the Delay-Tolerant Networking
      Research Group (DTNRG) of the Internet Research Task Force since 2002.
      The DTNRG has developed the Delay-Tolerant Networking Architecture 
      (RFC 4838) that the DTNWG uses as the basis for its work.  The key 
      components of this architecture are the bundle concept for 
      encapsulating data units, the bundle transmission protocol and the 
      underlying convergence layer architecture.
    
      The experimental DTN Bundle Protocol (RFC 5050) and Licklider
      Transmission Protocol (RFC 5326) have been shown to address the
      issues identified above in substantial fielded deployments in the space 
      sector [1].  RFC 5050 in conjunction with TCP- and UDP-based convergence 
      layers has been used successfully in a number of experiments both in 
      communications challenged environments around the edges of the Internet 
      and as an Internet overlay where applications require delay- and/or 
      disruption-tolerance [refs needed].  

      The success of the BP over convergence layer protocol stack -- the core 
      protocols of the "DTN Architecture" described in RFC 4838 -- may be 
      attributed to the following fundamental design principles:

	- There is never any expectation of contemporaneous end-to-end
          connectivity between any two network nodes.

	- Because end-to-end connectivity can never be assumed, each node
	  on the path between source and destination must be prepared to
	  handle incoming "bundles" of data that cannot immediately be
	  forwarded.

	- Again because end-to-end connectivity can never be assumed,
	  end-to-end conversational data exchange can never be assumed to
	  complete in a timely manner; protocol features that rely on
	  timely conversational data exchange must therefore be excluded
       from the architecture or coupled with DTN-aware proxies.

      The DTNWG believes that protocols adhering to these principles offer
      opportunities for enhancing the functionality of the Internet, including 

        - facilitating the extension of the Internet into environments such as 
          the ocean floor and deep space in which the core Internet protocols 
          operate sub-optimally for the reasons discussed earlier;

        - extending the Internet into communications challenged terrestrial 
          environments where it is not possible to provide continuous, low 
          delay Internet connections; and 

        - supporting Internet use cases that need DTN capabilities.

      We believe that the extensive research, demonstration, and
      pilot operations performed to date using the DTNRG protocols provides
      a firm basis for publishing Internet standards derived from that work.

      Work items related to Delay/Disruption Tolerant Networking include:

      o An informational "Problem Statement, Use Cases and Requirements"
        document - to be co-authored by industry partners with interest
        in progression of the working group standards-track work items.

      o A mechanism for the exchange of protocol data units, termed
	   "bundles", that are designed to obviate conversational communications
	   by containing values for all potentially relevant configuration
	   parameters. These protocol data units are typically larger than
	   network-layer packets. We will derive this bundle exchange mechanism
        from the DTN Bundle Protocol (BP) documented in RFC 5050 by publishing
        a new document for which [2] is a proposed first draft (where
        appendix A provides a summary of the proposed changes).

      o A security protocol for ensuring that the network in which bundles
	   are exchanged is secured against unauthorized access and denial of
	   service attacks, and to ensure data integrity and confidentiality
	   in that network where necessary.  We will derive this security
	   protocol from a "streamlined" adaptation of the DTN Bundle Security
	   Protocol documented in RFC 6257.

      o An informational "DTN Advanced Features Survey" document including
        candidate recharter work items such as routing, neighbor (contact)
        discovery, security key management, network management, bundle-in
        -bundle encapsulation, reliable bundle delivery, IPv6, etc. 

      o Simple convergence layer protocols for adaptation of the bundle
        protocol to underlying internetworks. We expect to derive these
        convergence layer protocols from the Datagram Convergence protocol
        documented in RFC 7122 and the TCP Convergence-Layer Protocol
        documented in RFC 7242.

      o A registry for DTN Service Identifiers
  
    The working group will consider adding supplementary work items based on
    new information and knowledge gained while working on the initial charter,
    as well as to accommodate new work items beyond the scope of the initial
    phase.
    
Goals and Milestones:
  start+0mos - Accept 'DTN Problem Statement, Use Cases and Requirements' as
               a working group work item intended for Informational.
  start+0mos - Accept 'Bundle Protocol Specification (RFC5050bis)' [2] as
               a working group work item intended for Proposed Standard.
  Start+0mos - Accept 'Streamlined Bundle Security Protocol (SBSP)' [3] as
               a working group work item intended for Proposed Standard.
  start+6mos - Working group getting concensus on changes to be implemented
               in RFC 5050(bis).
  start+6mos - Accept 'DTN Advanced Features Survey' as a working group work
               item intended for Informational.
  start+9mos - Working group getting consensus on merging RFC5050bis and
               SBSP into a combined draft or keep as separate drafts.
  start+12mos - Submit RFC5050bis and SBSP to the IESG either as a combined
                draft or as separate drafts.
  start+15mos - Submit Registry [4] and Simple Convergence Layer [5][6] as
                working group documents.
  start+16mos - Survey appropriate forums (e.g., DTNRG) for emerging
                technologies (e.g., convergence layer protocols, dynamic
                routing protocols, naming and addressing services, etc.)
                ready for transition into IETF DTN Working Group. Publish
                draft on survey results as independent submission related
                to the WG.
  start+18mos - Submit Registry and Simple Convergence Layer to IESG
  start+18mos - Recharter to accommodate new work items or close Working Group


[1] "BP/LTP deployment on EPOXI spacecraft" [2008],
    http://committees.comsoc.org/tccc/ccw/2010/slides/DINET_CCW.pdf  
[2] "Proposed Revised Bundle Protocol" [2014],
    https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-burleigh-bpv7/
[3] "Streamlined Bundle Security Protocol Specification" [2014],
    https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-irtf-dtnrg-sbsp/
[4] "Delay-Tolerant Networking Bundle Protocol IANA Registries" [2011],
    https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/rfc6255/
[5] "Datagram Convergence Layers ..." [2014],
    https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/rfc7122/
[6] "TCP Convergence-Layer Protocol..." [2014],
    https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/rfc7242/