RFC 3697 (rfc3697) - Page 1 of 9

IPv6 Flow Label Specification

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Network Working Group                                       J. Rajahalme
Request for Comments: 3697                                         Nokia
Category: Standards Track                                       A. Conta
                                                              Transwitch
                                                            B. Carpenter
                                                                     IBM
                                                              S. Deering
                                                                   Cisco
                                                              March 2004


                     IPv6 Flow Label Specification

Status of this Memo

   This document specifies an Internet standards track protocol for the
   Internet community, and requests discussion and suggestions for
   improvements.  Please refer to the current edition of the "Internet
   Official Protocol Standards" (STD 1) for the standardization state
   and status of this protocol.  Distribution of this memo is unlimited.

Copyright Notice

   Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2004).  All Rights Reserved.

Abstract

   This document specifies the IPv6 Flow Label field and the minimum
   requirements for IPv6 source nodes labeling flows, IPv6 nodes
   forwarding labeled packets, and flow state establishment methods.
   Even when mentioned as examples of possible uses of the flow
   labeling, more detailed requirements for specific use cases are out
   of scope for this document.

   The usage of the Flow Label field enables efficient IPv6 flow
   classification based only on IPv6 main header fields in fixed
   positions.

1.  Introduction

   A flow is a sequence of packets sent from a particular source to a
   particular unicast, anycast, or multicast destination that the source
   desires to label as a flow.  A flow could consist of all packets in a
   specific transport connection or a media stream.  However, a flow is
   not necessarily 1:1 mapped to a transport connection.






Rajahalme, et al.           Standards Track
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