Requirements for Internet gateways
RFC 1009
Document | Type |
RFC - Historic
(June 1987; No errata)
Obsoleted by RFC 1812
Obsoletes RFC 985
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Authors | |||
Last updated | 2013-03-02 | ||
Stream | Legacy | ||
Formats | plain text html pdf htmlized bibtex | ||
Stream | Legacy state | (None) | |
Consensus Boilerplate | Unknown | ||
RFC Editor Note | (None) | ||
IESG | IESG state | RFC 1009 (Historic) | |
Telechat date | |||
Responsible AD | (None) | ||
Send notices to | (None) |
Network Working Group R. Braden
Request for Comments: 1009 J. Postel
Obsoletes: 985 ISI
June 1987
Requirements for Internet Gateways
Status of this Memo
This document is a formal statement of the requirements to be met by
gateways used in the Internet system. As such, it is an official
specification for the Internet community. Distribution of this memo
is unlimited.
This RFC summarizes the requirements for gateways to be used between
networks supporting the Internet protocols. While it was written
specifically to support National Science Foundation research
programs, the requirements are stated in a general context and are
applicable throughout the Internet community.
The purpose of this document is to present guidance for vendors
offering gateway products that might be used or adapted for use in an
Internet application. It enumerates the protocols required and gives
references to RFCs and other documents describing the current
specifications. In a number of cases the specifications are evolving
and may contain ambiguous or incomplete information. In these cases
further discussion giving specific guidance is included in this
document. Specific policy issues relevant to the NSF scientific
networking community are summarized in an Appendix. As other
specifications are updated this document will be revised. Vendors
are encouraged to maintain contact with the Internet research
community.
1. Introduction
The following material is intended as an introduction and background
for those unfamiliar with the Internet architecture and the Internet
gateway model. General background and discussion on the Internet
architecture and supporting protocol suite can be found in the DDN
Protocol Handbook [25] and ARPANET Information Brochure [26], see
also [19, 28, 30, 31].
The Internet protocol architecture was originally developed under
DARPA sponsorship to meet both military and civilian communication
requirements [32]. The Internet system presently supports a variety
of government and government-sponsored operational and research
activities. In particular, the National Science Foundation (NSF) is
building a major extension to the Internet to provide user access to
Braden & Postel [Page 1]
RFC 1009 - Requirements for Internet Gateways June 1987
national supercomputer centers and other national scientific
resources, and to provide a computer networking capability to a large
number of universities and colleges.
In this document there are many terms that may be obscure to one
unfamiliar with the Internet protocols. There is not much to be done
about that but to learn, so dive in. There are a few terms that are
much abused in general discussion but are carefully and intentionally
used in this document. These few terms are defined here.
Packet A packet is the unit of transmission on a physical
network.
Datagram A datagram is the unit of transmission in the IP
protocol. To cross a particular network a datagram is
encapsulated inside a packet.
Router A router is a switch that receives data transmission
units from input interfaces and, depending on the
addresses in those units, routes them to the
appropriate output interfaces. There can be routers
at different levels of protocol. For example,
Interface Message Processors (IMPs) are packet-level
routers.
Gateway In the Internet documentation generally, and in this
document specifically, a gateway is an IP-level
router. In the Internet community the term has a long
history of this usage [32].
1.1. The DARPA Internet Architecture
1.1.1. Internet Protocols
The Internet system consists of a number of interconnected
packet networks supporting communication among host computers
using the Internet protocols. These protocols include the
Internet Protocol (IP), the Internet Control Message Protocol
(ICMP), the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP), and
application protocols depending upon them [22].
All Internet protocols use IP as the basic data transport
mechanism. IP [1,31] is a datagram, or connectionless,
internetwork service and includes provision for addressing,
type-of-service specification, fragmentation and reassembly,
and security information. ICMP [2] is considered an integral
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