IANA Allocation Guidelines for the Address Resolution Protocol (ARP)
draft-arkko-arp-iana-rules-00

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Abstract

This document specifies the IANA guidelines for allocating new values in the Address Resolution Protocol (ARP). This document also reserves some numbers for experimentation purposes.

1.  Introduction

This document specifies the IANA guidelines [RFC5226] (Narten, T. and H. Alvestrand, “Guidelines for Writing an IANA Considerations Section in RFCs,” May 2008.) for allocating new values for various fields in the Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) [RFC0826] (Plummer, D., “Ethernet Address Resolution Protocol: Or converting network protocol addresses to 48.bit Ethernet address for transmission on Ethernet hardware,” November 1982.). The change is also applicable to extensions of ARP defined in [RFC0903] (Finlayson, R., Mann, T., Mogul, J., and M. Theimer, “Reverse Address Resolution Protocol,” June 1984.), [RFC2390] (Bradley, T., Brown, C., and A. Malis, “Inverse Address Resolution Protocol,” September 1998.), [RFC1931] (Brownell, D., “Dynamic RARP Extensions for Automatic Network Address Acquisition,” April 1996.), and [RFC2225] (Laubach, M. and J. Halpern, “Classical IP and ARP over ATM,” April 1998.). The guidelines are given in Section 2 (IANA Considerations). Previously, no IANA guidance existed for such allocations.

This document also reserves some numbers for experimentation purposes. These numbers are given in Section 3 (Allocations Defined in This Document).

2.  IANA Considerations

The following rules apply to the fields of ARP:

ar$hrd (16 bits) Hardware address space

Requests for individual new ar$hrd values are made through First Come First Served [RFC5226] (Narten, T. and H. Alvestrand, “Guidelines for Writing an IANA Considerations Section in RFCs,” May 2008.). Requests for a batch of several new ar$hrd values are made through Expert Review [RFC5226] (Narten, T. and H. Alvestrand, “Guidelines for Writing an IANA Considerations Section in RFCs,” May 2008.). The expert should determine that the need to allocate the new values exists and that the existing values are insufficient to represent the new hardware address types.

ar$pro (16 bits) Protocol address space

These numbers share the Ethertype space. The Ethertype space is administered as described in [RFC5342] (Eastlake. , D., “IANA Considerations and IETF Protocol Usage for IEEE 802 Parameters,” September 2008.).

ar$op (16 bits) Opcode

Requests for new ar$op values are made through IETF Review or IESG Approval [RFC5226] (Narten, T. and H. Alvestrand, “Guidelines for Writing an IANA Considerations Section in RFCs,” May 2008.).

3.  Allocations Defined in This Document

When testing new protocol extension ideas, it is often necessary to use an actual constant in order to use the new function, even when testing in a closed environment. This document reserves the following numbers for experimentation purposes in ARP:

• One new ar$hrd value is allocated for experimental purposes, HW_EXP (TBD).
• Two new values for the ar$op are allocated for experimental purposes, OP_EXP1 (TBD) and OP_EXP2 (TBD).

Note that [RFC5342] (Eastlake. , D., “IANA Considerations and IETF Protocol Usage for IEEE 802 Parameters,” September 2008.), Section B.2 lists two Ethertypes that can be used for experimental purposes.

4.  Security Considerations

This specification does not change the security properties of the affected protocols.

However, a few words are necessary about the use of the experimental code points defined in Section 3 (Allocations Defined in This Document). Production networks do not necessarily support the use of experimental code points in ARP. Potentially harmful side-effects from the use of the experimental values should be carefully evaluated before deploying any experiment across networks that the owner of the experiment does not entirely control.

The network administrators should also ensure that each code point is used consistently to avoid interference between experiments.

5.  Acknowledgments

The lack of any current rules has come up as new values were requested from IANA. The author would like to thank Michelle Cotton in particular for bringing this issue up. When no rules exist, IANA consults the IESG for approval of the new values. The purpose of this specification is to establish the rules and allow IANA to operate based on the rules, without requiring confirmation from the IESG. The author would also like to thank Brian Carpenter, Thomas Narten, Scott Bradner, and Dave Thaler for feedback.

6. Normative References

Appendix A.  Changes from the Original ARP RFCs

This document specifies only the IANA rules associated with various fields in ARP, and does not make any other changes in the operation of the protocol itself.

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