1. List of rfcs for TCP/IP course: ------------------------------- RFCs or "Request for Comments" are documents traditionally kept in ASCII format (.txt) that document a particular approved (or ignored) TCP/IP protocol as part of the IETF engineering and design process. The focus is what is on the wire as packet bits, not what an operating system interface looks like or how the operating system or system programming is done. Sometimes the documents are out of date, purely informational, or even whimsical. In any case, an RFC is a specification for a protocol that may be newly proposed or in use on the Internet. Internet drafts are documents written in the IETF working groups that may or may not become RFCs over time, depending on the IETF RFC approval process. Any draft or RFC may be outdated or obviated by a new document as well. In summary, RFCs are of interest for network programming and network engineering. Drafts may be of use for any number of reasons, research and politics both included. In theory, drafts are not be used as citations in papers, but that does happen. RFCs can be cited in academic papers. Traditionally the format for RFCs is ASCII text. postscript versions have been produced in the past, and now pdf is also available. Over the course of the quarter, you are expected to use the web and anonymous ftp to visit an RFC site to obtain the following historic documents. Use anonymous ftp if you have never used anonymous ftp. This is a good opportunity. The top-level rfc site is as follows: http: www.rfc-editor.org Spend some time looking at this site to get the hang of it. alternatives (anonymous ftp): ftp: ftp.isi.edu (with anonymous ftp). ftp: ftp.rfc-editor.org/in-notes Note: RFCs may appear in a directory called in-notes or on other sites, may appear in a directory called "rfc/s". Internet-drafts usually appear in a directory with that name. There are other sites as documented on the rfc-editor.org pages as well. Acquire the following documents as we discuss the protocols in class. E.g., start out by making sure you can do anonymous ftp (you can use web client sometimes as well to do ftp, just set the url although that might be construed as cheating), and find the rfc index. Retrieve it and look it over. Then get the arpawocky and assigned numbers RFCs. When we get to IP, get the IP rfc and read it, etc. Same for UDP and TCP. Appreciate the size of the UDP RFC. 1. rfcindex - get one and look it over. 2. arpawocky - rfc527 3. Assigned Numbers - 1700 (find the latest one acc. to the index) Use the index and find the current RFC #. Then get the Assigned Numbers RFC && take a look at what is in it. I recommend that you do NOT print it out. It is quite huge. Are there any UDP or TCP apps that use ports that are not mentioned in this document (look at /etc/services on a UNIX computer) ? Note: RFC 1700 is probably the last time, assigned numbers will be issued as an RFC. The modern compendium is now a web site: http://www.iana.org/numbers.html 4. IP Internet Protocol rfc791 5. UDP - User Datagram Protocol - rfc768 Mostly get this to see how little there is to UDP. 6. TCP - Transmission Control Protocol - rfc793 As a "homework assignment" or a background problem, try to think up a a general question you can pose about network protocols and IETF standards and then go out and see what you can find on the subject. In general start from "now" and work your way backwards. Some questions are a bit imposing (but you can learn from them how things work). E.g., a hard question is: what is the history of SNMP and IETF RFC's (complicated). Some possible topics of investigation: What has come out recently on the web? The WWW HTTP and HTML protocols are new and are "moving targets"; i.e., they are undergoing continuous change. Are there Internet-drafts or RFCS on them? (Internet-drafts are documents written by anyone participating in the IETF that are "draft" RFC documents; i.e., they are not formally approved and may indeed vanish after six months on the net. They are typically kept in a directory that may be labeled /drafts or /internet-drafts at an ftp site. When and if they go through the RFC approval process, they may become new RFCs.) So you could answer this question specifically: what is the latest RFC that specifies HTTP as a protocol? or what are the sets of RFCs that specify TCP as a protocol? or what are the sets of RFCs that specify IPv6 (the network layer) as a protocol? What has come out recently on network security? E.g., RFC 1825 (IPSEC) is one such candidate. It is supposed to be historical at some point. Is there a replacement for it (or a draft?) Find all documents that have anything to do with Internet News (NNTP). Find the latest RFC/s for the OSPF routing protocol. What can you find on the subject of BGP routing protocol *security*? ------------------------------------------------------------- # this is a UNIX-based shellscript to retrieve rfcs #!/bin/sh #syntax: getrfc number [number...] PATH=/bin:/usrbin:/usr/ucb WHERE=ftp.isi.edu for i do echo "retrieving rfc $i from $WHERE" # ftp -n $WHERE > /dev/null 2>&1 <