Overview
Français
ABSTRACT
Both the global IPv4 address depletion and the subsequent multiplication of middleboxes like Network Address Translators in the Internet dramatically complicate everyday network management operations, let alone the risk of seriously degrading service performances.
The Port Control Protocol (PCP) that was recently standardized by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) is seen as one of the most attractive responses to this issue: PCP indeed relies upon a simple client/server architecture that aims at dynamically controlling the behavior of the aforementioned middleboxes. PCP is also very flexible from a functional evolution perspective, so that it becomes a de facto standard for the dynamic control of Internet resources. The protocol is designed to ease operating servers behind middleboxes and to optimize keep-alive messages that would severely impact some terminal devices such as mobile User Equipment (UE)..
This paper is an introduction to PCP: it details PCP design basics and operations,. The paper also illustrates typical PCP usage by means of flow charts.
Read this article from a comprehensive knowledge base, updated and supplemented with articles reviewed by scientific committees.
Read the articleAUTHORS
-
Mohamed BOUCADAIR: Network and IP Services Architect – France Telecom Orange
-
Christian JACQUENET: Director, Strategic IP Network Programs – France Telecom Orange
INTRODUCTION
This article describes the Port Control Protocol (PCP) and its uses. It is organized as follows:
1 describes the motivations and basic principles of the PCP protocol;
2 introduces the functional elements involved in a PCP architecture;
3 describes the PCP protocol mechanics, including the procedures for discovering PCP server(s) and transmitting PCP messages;
4 details the structure of a PCP message, including the common PCP header. This section describes the two PCP message types (MAP and PEER), as well as the use of PCP options;
The Ultimate Scientific and Technical Reference
This article is included in
Networks and Telecommunications
This offer includes:
Knowledge Base
Updated and enriched with articles validated by our scientific committees
Services
A set of exclusive tools to complement the resources
Practical Path
Operational and didactic, to guarantee the acquisition of transversal skills
Doc & Quiz
Interactive articles with quizzes, for constructive reading
Dynamic control of Internet resources
Overall context
Bibliography
The Ultimate Scientific and Technical Reference
