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IETF RFC 8075
Last modified on Wednesday, March 1st, 2017
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Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) A. Castellani
Request for Comments: 8075 University of Padova
Category: Standards Track S. Loreto
ISSN: 2070-1721 Ericsson
A. Rahman
InterDigital Communications, LLC
T. Fossati
Nokia
E. Dijk
Philips Lighting
February 2017
Guidelines for Mapping Implementations:
HTTP to the Constrained Application Protocol (CoAP)
 Abstract
This document provides reference information for implementing a
cross-protocol network proxy that performs translation from the HTTP
protocol to the Constrained Application Protocol (CoAP). This will
enable an HTTP client to access resources on a CoAP server through
the proxy. This document describes how an HTTP request is mapped to
a CoAP request and how a CoAP response is mapped back to an HTTP
response. This includes guidelines for status code, URI, and media
type mappings, as well as additional interworking advice.
Status of This Memo
This is an Internet Standards Track document.
This document is a product of the Internet Engineering Task Force
(IETF). It represents the consensus of the IETF community. It has
received public review and has been approved for publication by the
Internet Engineering Steering Group (IESG). Further information on
Internet Standards is available in Section 2 of RFC 7841.
Information about the current status of this document, any errata,
and how to provide feedback on it may be obtained at
http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 8075.
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 1 
RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
Copyright Notice
Copyright (c) 2017 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
document authors. All rights reserved.
This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
Provisions Relating to IETF Documents
(http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of
publication of this document. Please review these documents
carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect
to this document. Code Components extracted from this document must
include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of
the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as
described in the Simplified BSD License.
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 2
RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
2. Terminology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
3. HTTP-to-CoAP Proxy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
4. Use Cases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
5. URI Mapping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
5.1. URI Terminology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
5.2. Null Mapping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
5.3. Default Mapping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
5.3.1. Optional Scheme Omission . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
5.3.2. Encoding Caveats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
5.4. URI Mapping Template . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
5.4.1. Simple Form . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
5.4.2. Enhanced Form . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
5.5. Discovery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
5.5.1. Examples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
6. Media Type Mapping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
6.1. Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
6.2. 'application/coap-payload' Media Type . . . . . . . . . . 16
6.3. Loose Media Type Mapping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
6.4. Media Type to Content-Format Mapping Algorithm . . . . . 18
6.5. Content Transcoding . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
6.5.1. General . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
6.5.2. CoRE Link Format . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
6.6. Diagnostic Payloads . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
7. Response Code Mapping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
8. Additional Mapping Guidelines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
8.1. Caching and Congestion Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
8.2. Cache Refresh via Observe . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
8.3. Use of CoAP Block-Wise Transfer . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
8.4. CoAP Multicast . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
8.5. Timeouts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
9. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
9.1. New 'core.hc' Resource Type . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
9.2. New 'coap-payload' Internet Media Type . . . . . . . . . 26
10. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
10.1. Multicast . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
10.2. Traffic Overflow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
10.3. Handling Secured Exchanges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
10.4. URI Mapping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
11. References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
11.1. Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
11.2. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
Appendix A. Media Type Mapping Source Code . . . . . . . . . . . 35
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
Authors' Addresses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 3
RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
1. Introduction
The Constrained Application Protocol (CoAP) [RFC 7252] has been
designed with a twofold aim: it's an application protocol specialized
for constrained environments and it's easily used in architectures
based on Representational State Transfer (REST) [Fielding], such as
the web. The latter goal has led to defining CoAP to easily
interoperate with HTTP [RFC 7230] through an intermediary proxy that
performs cross-protocol conversion.
Section 10 of [RFC 7252] describes the fundamentals of the
CoAP-to-HTTP and the HTTP-to-CoAP cross-protocol mapping process.
However, [RFC 7252] focuses on the basic mapping of request methods
and simple response code mapping between HTTP and CoAP, while leaving
many details of the cross-protocol proxy for future definition.
Therefore, a primary goal of this document is to define a consistent
set of guidelines that an HTTP-to-CoAP proxy implementation should
adhere to. The key benefit to adhering to such guidelines is to
reduce variation between proxy implementations, thereby increasing
interoperability between an HTTP client and a CoAP server independent
of the proxy that implements the cross-protocol mapping. (For
example, a proxy conforming to these guidelines made by vendor A can
be easily replaced by a proxy from vendor B that also conforms to the
guidelines without breaking API semantics.)
This document describes HTTP mappings that apply to protocol elements
defined in the base CoAP specification [RFC 7252] and in the CoAP
block-wise transfer specification [RFC 7959]. It is up to CoAP
protocol extensions (new methods, response codes, options, content-
formats) to describe their own HTTP mappings, if applicable.
The rest of this document is organized as follows:
o Section 2 defines proxy terminology;
o Section 3 introduces the HTTP-to-CoAP proxy;
o Section 4 lists use cases in which HTTP clients need to contact
CoAP servers;
o Section 5 introduces a null, default, and advanced HTTP-to-CoAP
URI mapping syntax;
o Section 6 describes how to map HTTP media types to CoAP content-
formats, and vice versa;
o Section 7 describes how to map CoAP responses to HTTP responses;
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 4
RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
o Section 8 describes additional mapping guidelines related to
caching, congestion, multicast, timeouts, etc.; and
o Section 10 discusses the possible security impact of HTTP-to-CoAP
protocol mapping.
2. Terminology
The keywords "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
"SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "NOT RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and
"OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in
[RFC 2119].
This specification requires readers to be familiar with the
vocabulary and concepts discussed in [RFC 7228], in particular, the
terms "constrained nodes" and "constrained networks". Readers must
also be familiar with all of the terminology of the normative
references listed in this document, in particular [RFC 7252] (CoAP)
and [RFC 7230] (HTTP). In addition, this specification makes use of
the following terms:
HC Proxy
A proxy performing a cross-protocol mapping, in the context of
this document an HTTP-to-CoAP (HC) mapping. Specifically, the HC
Proxy acts as an HTTP server and a CoAP client. The HC Proxy can
take on the role of a forward, reverse, or interception Proxy.
Application Level Gateway (ALG)
An application-specific translation agent that allows an
application on a host in one address realm to connect to its
counterpart running on a host in a different realm transparently.
See Section 2.9 of [RFC 2663].
forward-proxy
A message-forwarding agent that is selected by the HTTP client,
usually via local configuration rules, to receive requests for
some type(s) of absolute URI and to attempt to satisfy those
requests via translation to the protocol indicated by the
absolute URI. The user agent decides (is willing) to use the
proxy as the forwarding/dereferencing agent for a predefined
subset of the URI space. In [RFC 7230], this is called a "proxy".
[RFC 7252] defines forward-proxy similarly.
reverse-proxy
As in [RFC 7230], a receiving agent that acts as a layer above
some other server(s) and translates the received requests to the
underlying server's protocol. A reverse-proxy behaves as an
origin (HTTP) server on its connection from the HTTP client. The
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 5
RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
HTTP client uses the "origin-form" (Section 5.3.1 of [RFC 7230])
as a request-target URI. (Note that a reverse-proxy appears to
an HTTP client as an origin server while a forward-proxy does
not. So, when communicating with a reverse-proxy, a client may
be unaware it is communicating with a proxy at all.)
interception proxy
As in [RFC 3040], a proxy that receives inbound HTTP traffic flows
through the process of traffic redirection, transparent to the
HTTP client.
3. HTTP-to-CoAP Proxy
An HC Proxy is accessed by an HTTP client that needs to fetch a
resource on a CoAP server. The HC Proxy handles the HTTP request by
mapping it to the equivalent CoAP request, which is then forwarded to
the appropriate CoAP server. The received CoAP response is then
mapped to an appropriate HTTP response and finally sent back to the
originating HTTP client.
Section 10.2 of [RFC 7252] defines basic normative requirements on
HTTP-to-CoAP mapping. This document provides additional details and
guidelines for the implementation of an HC Proxy.
Constrained Network
.-------------------.
/ .------. \
/ | CoAP | \
/ |server| \
|| '------' ||
|| ||
.--------. HTTP Request .------------. CoAP Req .------. ||
| HTTP |---------------->|HTTP-to-CoAP|----------->| CoAP | ||
| Client |<----------------| Proxy |<-----------|server| ||
'--------' HTTP Response '------------' CoAP Resp '------' ||
|| ||
|| .------. ||
|| | CoAP | ||
\ |server| .------. /
\ '------' | CoAP | /
\ |server| /
\ '------' /
'-----------------'
Figure 1: HTTP-To-CoAP Proxy Deployment Scenario
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 6
RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
Figure 1 illustrates an example deployment scenario. There, an HC
Proxy is located at the boundary of the constrained network domain
and acts as an ALG that allows only a very specific type of traffic
(i.e., authorized inbound HTTP requests and their associated outbound
CoAP responses) to pass through. All other kinds of traffic are
segregated within the respective network segments.
4. Use Cases
To illustrate a few situations in which HTTP-to-CoAP protocol
translation may be used, three use cases are described below.
1. Legacy building control application without CoAP: A building
control application that uses HTTP but not CoAP can check the
status of CoAP sensors and/or control actuators via an HC Proxy.
2. Making sensor data available to third parties on the web: For
demonstration or public interest purposes, an HC Proxy may be
configured to expose the contents of a CoAP sensor to the world
via the web (HTTP and/or HTTPS). Some sensors may only accept
secure 'coaps' requests; therefore, the proxy is configured to
translate requests to those devices accordingly. The HC Proxy is
furthermore configured to only pass through GET requests in order
to protect the constrained network.
3. Smartphone and home sensor: A smartphone can access directly a
CoAP home sensor using a mutually authenticated 'https' request,
provided its home router runs an HC Proxy and is configured with
the appropriate certificate. An HTML5 [W3C.REC-html5-20141028]
application on the smartphone can provide a friendly UI using the
standard (HTTP) networking functions of HTML5.
A key point in the above use cases is the expected nature of the URI
to be used by the HTTP client initiating the HTTP request to the HC
Proxy. Specifically, in use case #1, there will be no information
related to 'coap' or 'coaps' embedded in the HTTP URI as it is a
legacy HTTP client sending the request. Use case #2 is also expected
to be similar. In contrast, in use case #3, it is likely that the
HTTP client will specifically embed information related to 'coap' or
'coaps' in the HTTP URI of the HTTP request to the HC Proxy.
5. URI Mapping
Though, in principle, a CoAP URI could be directly used by an HTTP
client to dereference a CoAP resource through an HC Proxy; the
reality is that all major web browsers, networking libraries, and
command-line tools do not allow making HTTP requests using URIs with
a scheme 'coap' or 'coaps'.
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RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
Thus, there is a need for web applications to embed or "pack" a CoAP
URI into an HTTP URI so that it can be (non-destructively)
transported from the HTTP client to the HC Proxy. The HC Proxy can
then "unpack" the CoAP URI and finally dereference it via a CoAP
request to the target server.
URI mapping is the term used in this document to describe the process
through which the URI of a CoAP resource is transformed into an HTTP
URI so that:
o The requesting HTTP client can handle it; and
o The receiving HC Proxy can extract the intended CoAP URI
unambiguously.
To this end, the remainder of this section will identify:
o The default mechanism to map a CoAP URI into an HTTP URI;
o The URI Template format to express a class of CoAP-HTTP URI
mapping functions; and
o The discovery mechanism based on "Constrained RESTful Environments
(CoRE) Link Format" [RFC 6690] through which clients of an HC Proxy
can dynamically learn about the supported URI mapping template(s),
as well as the URI where the HC Proxy function is anchored.
5.1. URI Terminology
In the remainder of this section, the following terms will be used
with a distinctive meaning:
HC Proxy URI:
URI that refers to the HC Proxy function. It conforms to
syntax defined in Section 2.7 of [RFC 7230].
Target CoAP URI:
URI that refers to the (final) CoAP resource that has to be
dereferenced. It conforms to syntax defined in Section 6 of
[RFC 7252]. Specifically, its scheme is either 'coap' or
'coaps'.
Hosting HTTP URI:
URI that conforms to syntax in Section 2.7 of [RFC 7230]. Its
authority component refers to an HC Proxy, whereas a path
and/or query component(s) embed the information used by an HC
Proxy to extract the Target CoAP URI.
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RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
5.2. Null Mapping
The null mapping is the case where there is no Target CoAP URI
appended to the HC Proxy URI. In other words, it is a "pure" HTTP
URI that is sent to the HC Proxy. This would typically occur in
situations like use case #1 described in Section 4, and the proxy
would typically be a reverse-proxy. In this scenario, the HC Proxy
will determine through its own private algorithms what the Target
CoAP URI should be.
5.3. Default Mapping
The default mapping is for the Target CoAP URI to be appended as is
(with the only caveat discussed in Section 5.3.2) to the HC Proxy
URI, to form the Hosting HTTP URI. This is the effective request URI
(see Section 5.5 of [RFC 7230]) that will then be sent by the HTTP
client in the HTTP request to the HC Proxy.
For example: given an HC Proxy URI https://p.example.com/hc/ and a
Target CoAP URI coap://s.example.com/light, the resulting Hosting
HTTP URI would be https://p.example.com/hc/coap://s.example.com/
light.
Provided a correct Target CoAP URI, the Hosting HTTP URI resulting
from the default mapping will be a syntactically valid HTTP URI.
Furthermore, the Target CoAP URI can always be extracted
unambiguously from the Hosting HTTP URI.
There is no default for the HC Proxy URI. Therefore, it is either
known in advance, e.g., as a configuration preset, or dynamically
discovered using the mechanism described in Section 5.5.
The default URI mapping function SHOULD be implemented and SHOULD be
activated by default in an HC Proxy, unless there are valid reasons
(e.g., application specific) to use a different mapping function.
5.3.1. Optional Scheme Omission
When constructing a Hosting HTTP URI by embedding a Target CoAP URI,
the scheme (i.e., 'coap' or 'coaps'), the scheme component delimiter
(":"), and the double slash ("//") preceding the authority MAY be
omitted if a local default -- not defined by this document --
applies. If no prior mutual agreement exists between the client and
the HC Proxy, then a Target CoAP URI without the scheme component is
syntactically incorrect, and therefore:
o It MUST NOT be emitted by clients; and
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 9
RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
o It MUST elicit a suitable client error status (i.e., 4xx) by the
HC Proxy.
5.3.2. Encoding Caveats
When the authority of the Target CoAP URI is given as an IPv6address,
then the surrounding square brackets must be percent-encoded in the
Hosting HTTP URI, in order to comply with the syntax defined in
Section 3.3. of [RFC 3986] for a URI path segment. For example:
coap://[2001:db8::1]/light?on becomes
https://p.example.com/hc/coap://%5B2001:db8::1%5D/light?on. (Note
that the percent-encoded square brackets shall be reverted to their
non-percent-encoded form when the HC Proxy unpacks the Target CoAP
URI.)
Everything else can be safely copied verbatim from the Target CoAP
URI to the Hosting HTTP URI.
5.4. URI Mapping Template
This section defines a format for the URI Template [RFC 6570] used by
an HC Proxy to inform its clients about the expected syntax for the
Hosting HTTP URI. This can then be used by the HTTP client to
construct the effective request URI to be sent in the HTTP request to
the HC Proxy.
When instantiated, a URI mapping template is always concatenated to
an HC Proxy URI provided by the HC Proxy via discovery (see
Section 5.5), or by other means.
A simple form (Section 5.4.1) and an enhanced form (Section 5.4.2)
are provided to fit different users' requirements.
Both forms are expressed as Level 2 URI Templates [RFC 6570] to take
care of the expansion of values that are allowed to include reserved
URI characters. The syntax of all URI formats is specified in this
section in Augmented Backus-Naur Form (ABNF) [RFC 5234].
5.4.1. Simple Form
The simple form MUST be used for mappings where the Target CoAP URI
is going to be copied (using rules of Section 5.3.2) at some fixed
position into the Hosting HTTP URI.
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 10
RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
The "tu" template variable is defined below using the ABNF rules from
[RFC 3986], Sections 3.2.2, 3.2.3, 3.3, and 3.4. It is intended to be
used in a template definition to represent a Target CoAP URI:
tu = [ ( "coap:" / "coaps:" ) "//" ] host [ ":" port ] path-abempty
[ "?" query ]
Note that the same considerations as in Section 5.3.1 apply, in that
the CoAP scheme may be omitted from the Hosting HTTP URI.
5.4.1.1. Examples
All the following examples (given as a specific URI mapping template,
a Target CoAP URI, and the produced Hosting HTTP URI) use
https://p.example.com/hc/ as the HC Proxy URI. Note that these
examples all define mapping templates that deviate from the default
template of Section 5.3 in order to illustrate the use of the above
template variables.
1. Target CoAP URI is a query argument of the Hosting HTTP URI:
?target_uri={+tu}
coap://s.example.com/light
=> https://p.example.com/hc/?target_uri=coap://s.example.com/light
whereas
coaps://s.example.com/light
=> https://p.example.com/hc/?target_uri=coaps://s.example.com/light
2. Target CoAP URI in the path component of the Hosting HTTP URI:
forward/{+tu}
coap://s.example.com/light
=> https://p.example.com/hc/forward/coap://s.example.com/light
whereas
coaps://s.example.com/light
=> https://p.example.com/hc/forward/coaps://s.example.com/light
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RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
3. Target CoAP URI is a query argument of the Hosting HTTP URI;
client decides to omit the scheme because a default is agreed
beforehand between client and proxy:
?coap_uri={+tu}
coap://s.example.com/light
=> https://p.example.com/hc/?coap_uri=s.example.com/light
5.4.2. Enhanced Form
The enhanced form can be used to express more sophisticated mappings
of the Target CoAP URI into the Hosting HTTP URI, i.e., mappings that
do not fit into the simple form.
There MUST be at most one instance of each of the following template
variables in a URI mapping template definition:
s = "coap" / "coaps" ; from [RFC 7252], Sections 6.1 and 6.2
hp = host [":" port] ; from [RFC 3986], Sections 3.2.2 and 3.2.3
p = path-abempty ; from [RFC 3986], Section 3.3
q = query ; from [RFC 3986], Section 3.4
qq = [ "?" query ] ; qq is empty if and only if 'query' is empty
The qq form is used when the path and the (optional) query components
are to be copied verbatim from the Target CoAP URI into the Hosting
HTTP URI, i.e., as "{+p}{+qq}". Instead, the q form is used when the
query and path are mapped as separate entities, e.g., as in
"coap_path={+p}&coap_query={+q}". So q and qq MUST be used in mutual
exclusion in a template definition.
5.4.2.1. Examples
All the following examples (given as a specific URI mapping template,
a Target CoAP URI, and the produced Hosting HTTP URI) use
https://p.example.com/hc/ as the HC Proxy URI.
1. Target CoAP URI components in path segments and optional query in
query component:
{+s}/{+hp}{+p}{+qq}
coap://s.example.com/light
=> https://p.example.com/hc/coap/s.example.com/light
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RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
whereas
coap://s.example.com/light?on
=> https://p.example.com/hc/coap/s.example.com/light?on
2. Target CoAP URI components split in individual query arguments:
?s={+s}&hp={+hp}&p={+p}&q={+q}
coap://s.example.com/light
=> https://p.example.com/hc/?s=coap&hp=s.example.com&p=/light&q=
whereas
coaps://s.example.com/light?on
=> https://p.example.com/hc/?s=coaps&hp=s.example.com&p=/light&q=on
5.5. Discovery
In order to accommodate site-specific needs while allowing third
parties to discover the proxy function, the HC Proxy SHOULD publish
information related to the location and syntax of the HC Proxy
function using the CoRE Link Format [RFC 6690] interface.
To this aim, a new Resource Type, "core.hc", is defined in this
document. It can be used as the value for the "rt" attribute in a
query to the "/.well-known/core" resource in order to locate the URI
where the HC Proxy function is anchored, i.e., the HC Proxy URI.
Along with it, the new target attribute "hct" is defined in this
document. This attribute MAY be returned in a "core.hc" link to
provide the URI mapping template associated with the mapping
resource. The default template given in Section 5.3, i.e., {+tu},
MUST be assumed if no "hct" attribute is found in a returned link.
If a "hct" attribute is present in a returned link, the client MUST
use it to create a Hosting HTTP URI.
The URI mapping SHOULD be discoverable (as specified in [RFC 6690]) on
both the HTTP and the CoAP side of the HC Proxy, with one important
difference: on the CoAP side, the link associated with the "core.hc"
resource always needs an explicit anchor parameter referring to the
HTTP origin [RFC 6454], while on the HTTP interface, the context URI
of the link may be equal to the HTTP origin of the discovery request:
in that case, the anchor parameter is not needed.
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5.5.1. Examples
o The first example exercises the CoAP interface and assumes that
the default template, {+tu}, is used. For example, a smartphone
may discover the public HC Proxy before leaving the home network.
Then, when outside the home network, the smartphone will be able
to query the appropriate home sensor.
Req: GET coap://[ff02::fd]/.well-known/core?rt=core.hc
Res: 2.05 Content
</hc/>;anchor="https://p.example.com";rt="core.hc"
o The second example -- also on the CoAP side of the HC Proxy --
uses a custom template, i.e., one where the CoAP URI is carried
inside the query component, thus the returned link carries the URI
Template to be used in an explicit "hct" attribute:
Req: GET coap://[ff02::fd]/.well-known/core?rt=core.hc
Res: 2.05 Content
</hc/>;anchor="https://p.example.com";
rt="core.hc";hct="?uri={+tu}"
On the HTTP side, link information can be serialized in more than one
way:
o using the 'application/link-format' content type:
Req: GET /.well-known/core?rt=core.hc HTTP/1.1
Host: p.example.com
Res: HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Type: application/link-format
Content-Length: 19
</hc/>;rt="core.hc"
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RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
o using the 'application/link-format+json' content type as defined
in [CoRE-JSON-CBOR]:
Req: GET /.well-known/core?rt=core.hc HTTP/1.1
Host: p.example.com
Res: HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Type: application/link-format+json
Content-Length: 32
[{"href":"/hc/","rt":"core.hc"}]
6. Media Type Mapping
6.1. Overview
An HC Proxy needs to translate HTTP media types (Section 3.1.1.1 of
[RFC 7231]) and content codings (Section 3.1.2.2 of [RFC 7231]) into
CoAP content-formats (Section 12.3 of [RFC 7252]), and vice versa.
Media type translation can happen in GET, PUT, or POST requests going
from HTTP to CoAP, in 2.xx (i.e., successful) responses going from
CoAP to HTTP, and in 4.xx/5.xx error responses with a diagnostic
payload. Specifically, PUT and POST need to map both the Content-
Type and Content-Encoding HTTP headers into a single CoAP Content-
Format option, whereas GET needs to map Accept and Accept-Encoding
HTTP headers into a single CoAP Accept option. To generate the HTTP
response, the CoAP Content-Format option is mapped back to a suitable
HTTP Content-Type and Content-Encoding combination.
An HTTP request carrying a Content-Type and Content-Encoding
combination that the HC Proxy is unable to map to an equivalent CoAP
Content-Format SHALL elicit a 415 (Unsupported Media Type) response
by the HC Proxy.
On the content negotiation side, failure to map Accept and Accept-*
headers SHOULD be silently ignored: the HC Proxy SHOULD therefore
forward as a CoAP request with no Accept option. The HC Proxy thus
disregards the Accept/Accept-* header fields by treating the response
as if it is not subject to content negotiation, as mentioned in
Section 5.3 of [RFC 7231]. However, an HC Proxy implementation is
free to attempt mapping a single Accept header in a GET request to
multiple CoAP GET requests, each with a single Accept option, which
are then tried in sequence until one succeeds. Note that an HTTP
Accept */* MUST be mapped to a CoAP request without an Accept option.
While the CoAP-to-HTTP direction always has a well-defined mapping
(with the exception examined in Section 6.2), the HTTP-to-CoAP
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direction is more problematic because the source set, i.e.,
potentially 1000+ IANA-registered media types, is much bigger than
the destination set, i.e., the mere six values initially defined in
Section 12.3 of [RFC 7252].
Depending on the tight/loose coupling with the application(s) for
which it proxies, the HC Proxy could implement different media type
mappings.
When tightly coupled, the HC Proxy knows exactly which content-
formats are supported by the applications and can be strict when
enforcing its forwarding policies in general, and the media type
mapping in particular.
On the other hand, when the HC Proxy is a general purpose ALG, being
too strict could significantly reduce the amount of traffic that it
would be able to successfully forward. In this case, the "loose"
media type mapping detailed in Section 6.3 MAY be implemented.
The latter grants more evolution of the surrounding ecosystem, at the
cost of allowing more attack surface. In fact, as a result of such
strategy, payloads would be forwarded more liberally across the
unconstrained/constrained network boundary of the communication path.
6.2. 'application/coap-payload' Media Type
If the HC Proxy receives a CoAP response with a Content-Format that
it does not recognize (e.g., because the value has been registered
after the proxy has been deployed, or the CoAP server uses an
experimental value that is not registered), then the HC Proxy SHALL
return a generic "application/coap-payload" media type with numeric
parameter "cf" as defined in Section 9.2.
For example, the CoAP content-format '60' ("application/cbor") would
be represented by "application/coap-payload;cf=60", if the HC Proxy
doesn't recognize the content-format '60'.
An HTTP client may use the media type "application/coap-payload" as a
means to send a specific content-format to a CoAP server via an HC
Proxy if the client has determined that the HC Proxy does not
directly support the type mapping it needs. This case may happen
when dealing, for example, with newly registered, yet to be
registered, or experimental CoAP content-formats. However, unless
explicitly configured to allow pass-through of unknown content-
formats, the HC Proxy SHOULD NOT forward requests carrying a Content-
Type or Accept header with an "application/coap-payload", and return
an appropriate client error instead.
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6.3. Loose Media Type Mapping
By structuring the type information in a super-class (e.g., "text")
followed by a finer-grained sub-class (e.g., "html"), and optional
parameters (e.g., "charset=utf-8"), Internet media types provide a
rich and scalable framework for encoding the type of any given
entity.
This approach is not applicable to CoAP, where content-formats
conflate an Internet media type (potentially with specific
parameters) and a content coding into one small integer value.
To remedy this loss of flexibility, we introduce the concept of a
"loose" media type mapping, where media types that are
specializations of a more generic media type can be aliased to their
super-class and then mapped (if possible) to one of the CoAP content-
formats. For example, "application/soap+xml" can be aliased to
"application/xml", which has a known conversion to CoAP. In the
context of this "loose" media type mapping, "application/
octet-stream" can be used as a fallback when no better alias is found
for a specific media type.
Table 1 defines the default lookup table for the "loose" media type
mapping. It is expected that an implementation can refine it because
either application-specific knowledge is given or new Content-Formats
are defined. Given an input media type, the table returns its best
generalized media type using the most specific match, i.e., the table
entries are compared to the input in top to bottom order until an
entry matches.
+-----------------------------+--------------------------+
| Internet media type pattern | Generalized media type |
+-----------------------------+--------------------------+
| application/*+xml | application/xml |
| application/*+json | application/json |
| application/*+cbor | application/cbor |
| text/xml | application/xml |
| text/* | text/plain |
| */* | application/octet-stream |
+-----------------------------+--------------------------+
Table 1: Media Type Generalization Lookup Table
The "loose" media type mapping is an OPTIONAL feature.
Implementations supporting this kind of mapping should provide a
flexible way to define the set of media type generalizations allowed.
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6.4. Media Type to Content-Format Mapping Algorithm
This section defines the algorithm used to map an HTTP Internet media
type to its correspondent CoAP content-format; it can be used as a
building block for translating HTTP Content-Type and Accept headers
into CoAP Content-Format and Accept Options.
The algorithm uses an IANA-maintained table, "CoAP Content-Formats",
as established by Section 12.3 of [RFC 7252] plus, possibly, any
locally defined extension of it. Optionally, the table and lookup
mechanism described in Section 6.3 can be used if the implementation
chooses so.
Note that the algorithm assumes an "identity" Content-Encoding and
expects the resource body has been already successfully content
decoded or transcoded to the desired format.
In the following (Figure 2):
o media_type is the media type to translate;
o coap_cf_registry is a lookup table matching the "CoAP Content-
Formats" registry; and
o loose_mapper is an optional lookup table describing the loose
media type mappings (e.g., the one defined in Table 1).
The full source code is provided in Appendix A.
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def mt2cf(media_type, encoding=None,
coap_cf_registry=CoAPContentFormatRegistry(),
loose_mapper=None):
"""Return a CoAP Content-Format given an Internet media type and
its optional encoding. The current (as of 2016/10/24) "CoAP
Content-Formats" registry is supplied by default. An optional
'loose-mapping' implementation can be supplied by the caller."""
assert media_type is not None
assert coap_cf_registry is not None
# Lookup the "CoAP Content-Formats" registry
content_format = coap_cf_registry.lookup(media_type, encoding)
# If an exact match is not found and a loose mapper has been
# supplied, try to use it to get a media type with which to
# retry the "CoAP Content-Formats" registry lookup.
if content_format is None and loose_mapper is not None:
content_format = coap_cf_registry.lookup(
loose_mapper.lookup(media_type), encoding)
return content_format
Figure 2
6.5. Content Transcoding
6.5.1. General
Payload content transcoding is an OPTIONAL feature. Implementations
supporting this feature should provide a flexible way to define the
set of transcodings allowed.
The HC Proxy might decide to transcode the received representation to
a different (compatible) format when an optimized version of a
specific format exists. For example, an XML-encoded resource could
be transcoded to Efficient XML Interchange (EXI) format, or a JSON-
encoded resource into Concise Binary Object Representation (CBOR)
[RFC 7049], effectively achieving compression without losing any
information.
However, there are a few important factors to keep in mind when
enabling a transcoding function:
1. Maliciously crafted inputs coming from the HTTP side might
inflate in size (see, for example, Section 4.2 of [RFC 7049]),
therefore creating a security threat for both the HC Proxy and
the target resource.
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2. Transcoding can lose information in non-obvious ways. For
example, encoding an XML document using schema-informed EXI
encoding leads to a loss of information when the destination does
not know the exact schema version used by the encoder. That
means that whenever the HC Proxy transcodes "application/xml" to
"application/exi", in-band metadata could be lost.
3. When the Content-Type is mapped, there is a risk that the content
with the destination type would have malware not active in the
source type.
It is crucial that these risks are well understood and carefully
weighed against the actual benefits before deploying the transcoding
function.
6.5.2. CoRE Link Format
The CoRE Link Format [RFC 6690] is a set of links (i.e., URIs and
their formal relationships) that is carried as content payload in a
CoAP response. These links usually include CoAP URIs that might be
translated by the HC Proxy to the correspondent HTTP URIs using the
implemented URI mapping function (see Section 5). Such a translation
process would inspect the forwarded traffic and attempt to rewrite
the body of resources with an application/link-format media type,
mapping the embedded CoAP URIs to their HTTP counterparts. Some
potential issues with this approach are:
1. The client may be interested in retrieving original (unaltered)
CoAP payloads through the HC Proxy, not modified versions.
2. Tampering with payloads is incompatible with resources that are
integrity protected (although this is a problem with transcoding
in general).
3. The HC Proxy needs to fully understand syntax and semantics
defined in [RFC 6690], otherwise there is an inherent risk to
corrupt the payloads.
Therefore, CoRE Link Format payload should only be transcoded at the
risk and discretion of the proxy implementer.
6.6. Diagnostic Payloads
CoAP responses may, in certain error cases, contain a diagnostic
message in the payload explaining the error situation, as described
in Section 5.5.2 of [RFC 7252]. If present, the CoAP diagnostic
payload SHOULD be copied into the HTTP response body with the media
type of the response set to "text/plain;charset=utf-8". The CoAP
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diagnostic payload MUST NOT be copied into the HTTP reason-phrase,
since it potentially contains CR-LF characters that are incompatible
with HTTP reason-phrase syntax.
7. Response Code Mapping
Table 2 defines the HTTP response status codes to which each CoAP
response code SHOULD be mapped. Multiple HTTP status codes in the
second column for a given CoAP response code indicates that multiple
HTTP responses are possible for the same CoAP response code,
depending on the conditions cited in the Notes (see the third column
and text below the table).
+-------------------------------+----------------------------+------+
| CoAP Response Code | HTTP Status Code | Note |
+-------------------------------+----------------------------+------+
| 2.01 Created | 201 Created | 1 |
| 2.02 Deleted | 200 OK | 2 |
| | 204 No Content | 2 |
| 2.03 Valid | 304 Not Modified | 3 |
| | 200 OK | 4 |
| 2.04 Changed | 200 OK | 2 |
| | 204 No Content | 2 |
| 2.05 Content | 200 OK | |
| 2.31 Continue | N/A | 10 |
| 4.00 Bad Request | 400 Bad Request | |
| 4.01 Unauthorized | 403 Forbidden | 5 |
| 4.02 Bad Option | 400 Bad Request | 6 |
| | 500 Internal Server Error | 6 |
| 4.03 Forbidden | 403 Forbidden | |
| 4.04 Not Found | 404 Not Found | |
| 4.05 Method Not Allowed | 400 Bad Request | 7 |
| | 405 Method Not Allowed | 7 |
| 4.06 Not Acceptable | 406 Not Acceptable | |
| 4.08 Request Entity Incomplt. | N/A | 10 |
| 4.12 Precondition Failed | 412 Precondition Failed | |
| 4.13 Request Ent. Too Large | 413 Payload Too Large | 11 |
| 4.15 Unsupported Content-Fmt. | 415 Unsupported Media Type | |
| 5.00 Internal Server Error | 500 Internal Server Error | |
| 5.01 Not Implemented | 501 Not Implemented | |
| 5.02 Bad Gateway | 502 Bad Gateway | |
| 5.03 Service Unavailable | 503 Service Unavailable | 8 |
| 5.04 Gateway Timeout | 504 Gateway Timeout | |
| 5.05 Proxying Not Supported | 502 Bad Gateway | 9 |
+-------------------------------+----------------------------+------+
Table 2: CoAP-HTTP Response Code Mappings
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Notes:
1. A CoAP server may return an arbitrary format payload along with
this response. If present, this payload MUST be returned as an
entity in the HTTP 201 response. Section 6.3.2 of [RFC 7231]
does not put any requirement on the format of the entity. (In
the past, [RFC 2616] did. Note that [RFC 2616] has been obsoleted
by [RFC 7230].)
2. The HTTP code is 200 or 204, respectively, for the case where a
CoAP server returns a payload or not. [RFC 7231], Section 6.3
requires code 200 in case a representation of the action result
is returned for DELETE/POST/PUT, and code 204 if not. Hence, a
proxy MUST transfer any CoAP payload contained in a CoAP 2.02
response to the HTTP client using a 200 OK response.
3. HTTP code 304 (Not Modified) is sent if the HTTP client
performed a conditional HTTP request and the CoAP server
responded with 2.03 (Valid) to the corresponding CoAP validation
request. Note that Section 4.1 of [RFC 7232] puts some
requirements on header fields that must be present in the HTTP
304 response.
4. A 200 response to a CoAP 2.03 occurs only when the HC Proxy, for
efficiency reasons, is running a local cache. An unconditional
HTTP GET that produces a cache-hit could trigger a revalidation
(i.e., a conditional GET) on the CoAP side. The proxy receiving
2.03 updates the freshness of its cached representation and
returns it to the HTTP client.
5. An HTTP 401 Unauthorized (Section 3.1 of [RFC 7235]) response is
not applicable because there is no equivalent of
WWW-Authenticate in CoAP, which is mandatory in an HTTP 401
response.
6. If the proxy has a way to determine that the Bad Option is due
to the straightforward mapping of a client request header into a
CoAP option, then returning HTTP 400 (Bad Request) is
appropriate. In all other cases, the proxy MUST return HTTP 500
(Internal Server Error) stating its inability to provide a
suitable translation to the client's request.
7. A CoAP 4.05 (Method Not Allowed) response SHOULD normally be
mapped to an HTTP 400 (Bad Request) code, because the HTTP 405
response would require specifying the supported methods -- which
are generally unknown. In this case, the HC Proxy SHOULD also
return an HTTP reason-phrase in the HTTP status line that starts
with the string "CoAP server returned 4.05" in order to
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facilitate troubleshooting. However, if the HC Proxy has more
granular information about the supported methods for the
requested resource (e.g., via a Resource Directory ([CoRE-RD])),
then it MAY send back an HTTP 405 (Method Not Allowed) with a
properly filled in "Allow" response-header field (Section 7.4.1
of [RFC 7231]).
8. The value of the HTTP "Retry-After" response-header field is
taken from the value of the CoAP Max-Age Option, if present.
9. This CoAP response can only happen if the proxy itself is
configured to use a CoAP forward-proxy (Section 5.7 of
[RFC 7252]) to execute some, or all, of its CoAP requests.
10. Only used in CoAP block-wise transfer [RFC 7959] between HC Proxy
and CoAP server; never translated into an HTTP response.
11. Only returned to the HTTP client if the HC Proxy was unable to
successfully complete the request by retrying it with CoAP
block-wise transfer; see Section 8.3.
8. Additional Mapping Guidelines
8.1. Caching and Congestion Control
An HC Proxy should cache CoAP responses and reply whenever applicable
with a cached representation of the requested resource.
If the HTTP client drops the connection after the HTTP request was
made, an HC Proxy should wait for the associated CoAP response and
cache it if possible. Subsequent requests to the HC Proxy for the
same resource can use the result present in cache, or, if a response
has still to come, the HTTP requests will wait on the open CoAP
request.
According to [RFC 7252], a proxy must limit the number of outstanding
requests to a given CoAP server to NSTART. To limit the amount of
aggregate traffic to a constrained network, the HC Proxy should also
put a limit on the number of concurrent CoAP requests pending on the
same constrained network; further incoming requests may either be
queued or be dropped (returning 503 Service Unavailable). This limit
and the proxy queueing/dropping behavior should be configurable.
Highly volatile resources that are being frequently requested may be
observed [RFC 7641] by the HC Proxy to keep their cached
representation fresh while minimizing the amount of CoAP traffic in
the constrained network (see Section 8.2).
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8.2. Cache Refresh via Observe
There are cases where using the CoAP observe protocol [RFC 7641] to
handle proxy cache refresh is preferable to the validation mechanism
based on the entity-tag (ETag) as defined in [RFC 7252]. Such
scenarios include sleepy CoAP nodes -- with possibly high variance in
requests' distribution -- which would greatly benefit from a server-
driven cache update mechanism. Ideal candidates for CoAP observe are
also crowded or very low throughput networks, where reduction of the
total number of exchanged messages is an important requirement.
This subsection aims at providing a practical evaluation method to
decide whether refreshing a cached resource R is more efficiently
handled via ETag validation or by establishing an observation on R.
The idea being that the HC Proxy proactively installs an observation
on a "popular enough" resource and actively monitors:
a. Its update pattern on the CoAP side
b. The request pattern on the HTTP side
and uses the formula below to determine whether the observation
should be kept alive or shut down.
Let T_R be the mean time between two client requests to resource R,
let T_C be the mean time between two representation changes of R, and
let M_R be the mean number of CoAP messages per second exchanged to
and from resource R. If we assume that the initial cost for
establishing the observation is negligible, an observation on R
reduces M_R if and only if T_R < 2*T_C with respect to using ETag
validation, that is, if and only if the mean arrival rate of requests
for resource R is greater than half the change rate of R.
When observing the resource R, M_R is always upper bounded by 2/T_C.
8.3. Use of CoAP Block-Wise Transfer
An HC Proxy SHOULD support CoAP block-wise transfers [RFC 7959] to
allow transport of large CoAP payloads while avoiding excessive link-
layer fragmentation in constrained networks and to cope with small
datagram buffers in CoAP endpoints as described in [RFC 7252],
Section 4.6.
An HC Proxy SHOULD attempt to retry a payload-carrying CoAP PUT or
POST request with block-wise transfer if the destination CoAP server
responded with 4.13 (Request Entity Too Large) to the original
request. An HC Proxy SHOULD attempt to use block-wise transfer when
sending a CoAP PUT or POST request message that is larger than
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BLOCKWISE_THRESHOLD bytes. The value of BLOCKWISE_THRESHOLD is
implementation specific; for example, it can be:
o Calculated based on a known or typical UDP datagram buffer size
for CoAP endpoints, or
o Set to N times the known size of a link-layer frame in a
constrained network where, e.g., N=5, or
o Preset to a known IP MTU value, or
o Set to a known Path MTU value.
The value BLOCKWISE_THRESHOLD, or the parameters from which it is
calculated, should be configurable in a proxy implementation. The
maximum block size the proxy will attempt to use in CoAP requests
should also be configurable.
The HC Proxy SHOULD detect CoAP endpoints not supporting block-wise
transfers. This can be done by checking for a 4.02 (Bad Option)
response returned by an endpoint in response to a CoAP request with a
Block* Option, and subsequent absence of the 4.02 in response to the
same request without Block* Options. This allows the HC Proxy to be
more efficient, not attempting repeated block-wise transfers to CoAP
servers that do not support it.
8.4. CoAP Multicast
An HC Proxy MAY support CoAP multicast. If it does, the HC Proxy
sends out a multicast CoAP request if the Target CoAP URI's authority
is a multicast IP literal or resolves to a multicast IP address. If
the HC Proxy does not support CoAP multicast, it SHOULD respond 403
(Forbidden) to any valid HTTP request that maps to a CoAP multicast
request.
Details related to supporting CoAP multicast are currently out of
scope of this document since in a proxy scenario, an HTTP client
typically expects to receive a single response, not multiple.
However, an HC Proxy that implements CoAP multicast may include
application-specific functions to aggregate multiple CoAP responses
into a single HTTP response. We suggest using the "application/http"
Internet media type (Section 8.3.2 of [RFC 7230]) to enclose a set of
one or more HTTP response messages, each representing the mapping of
one CoAP response.
For further considerations related to the handling of multicast
requests, see Section 10.1.
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8.5. Timeouts
If the CoAP server takes a long time in responding, the HTTP client
or any other proxy in between may timeout. Further discussion of
timeouts in HTTP is available in Section 6.5 of [RFC 7230].
An HC Proxy MUST define an internal timeout for each pending CoAP
request, because the CoAP server may silently die before completing
the request. Assuming the proxy uses confirmable CoAP requests, such
timeout value T SHOULD be
T = MAX_RTT + MAX_SERVER_RESPONSE_DELAY
where MAX_RTT is defined in [RFC 7252] and MAX_SERVER_RESPONSE_DELAY
is defined as the worst-case expected response delay of the CoAP
server. If unknown, a default value of 250 seconds can be used for
MAX_SERVER_RESPONSE_DELAY as in Section 2.5 of [RFC 7390].
9. IANA Considerations
9.1. New 'core.hc' Resource Type
This document registers a new Resource Type (rt=) Link Target
Attribute, 'core.hc', in the "Resource Type (rt=) Link Target
Attribute Values" subregistry under the "Constrained RESTful
Environments (CoRE) Parameters" registry.
Attribute Value: core.hc
Description: HTTP-to-CoAP mapping base resource.
Reference: See Section 5.5 of RFC 8075.
9.2. New 'coap-payload' Internet Media Type
This document defines the "application/coap-payload" media type with
a single parameter "cf". This media type represents any payload that
a CoAP message can carry, having a content-format that can be
identified by an integer in range 0-65535 corresponding to a CoAP
Content-Format parameter ([RFC 7252], Section 12.3). The parameter
"cf" is the integer defining the CoAP content-format.
Type name: application
Subtype name: coap-payload
Required parameters: "cf" (CoAP Content-Format integer in range
0-65535 denoting the content-format of the CoAP payload carried, as
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defined by the "CoAP Content-Formats" subregistry that is part of the
"Constrained RESTful Environments (CoRE) Parameters" registry).
Optional parameters: None
Encoding considerations: Common use is BINARY. The specific CoAP
content-format encoding considerations for the selected Content-
Format ("cf" parameter) apply. The encoding can vary based on the
value of the "cf" parameter.
Security considerations: The specific CoAP content-format security
considerations for the selected Content-Format ("cf" parameter)
apply.
Interoperability considerations: This media type can never be used
directly in CoAP messages because there are no means available to
encode the mandatory "cf" parameter in CoAP.
Published specification: RFC 8075
Applications that use this media type: HTTP-to-CoAP proxies.
Fragment identifier considerations: CoAP does not support URI
fragments; therefore, a CoAP payload fragment cannot be identified.
Fragments are not applicable for this media type.
Additional information:
Deprecated alias names for this type: N/A
Magic number(s): N/A
File extension(s): N/A
Macintosh file type code(s): N/A
Person and email address to contact for further information:
Esko Dijk ("esko@ieee.org")
Intended usage: COMMON
Restrictions on usage:
An application (or user) can only use this media type if it has to
represent a CoAP payload of which the specified CoAP Content-Format
is an unrecognized number, such that a proper translation directly to
the equivalent HTTP media type is not possible.
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Author: CoRE WG
Change controller: IETF
Provisional registration: No
10. Security Considerations
The security considerations in Section 9.2 of [RFC 7230] apply in full
to the HC Proxy. This section discusses security aspects and
requirements that are specific to the deployment and operation of an
HC Proxy.
An HC Proxy located at the boundary of a constrained network is an
easy single point of failure for reducing availability. As such,
special care should be taken in designing, developing, and operating
it, keeping in mind that, in most cases, it has fewer limitations
than the constrained devices it is serving. In particular, its
quality of implementation and operation -- i.e., use of current
software development practices, careful selection of third-party
libraries, sane configuration defaults, and an expedited way to
upgrade a running instance -- are all essential attributes of the HC
Proxy.
The correctness of request parsing in general (including any content
transcoding), and of URI translation in particular, is essential to
the security of the HC Proxy function. This is especially true when
the constrained network hosts devices with genuinely limited
capabilities. For this purpose, see also Sections 9.3, 9.4, 9.5 and
9.6 of [RFC 7230] for well-known issues related to HTTP request
parsing and Section 11.1 of [RFC 7252] for an overview of CoAP-
specific concerns related to URI processing -- in particular, the
potential impact on access control mechanisms that are based on URIs.
An HC Proxy MUST implement Transport Layer Security (TLS) with a Pre-
Shared Key (PSK) [RFC 4279] and SHOULD implement TLS [RFC 5246] with
support for client authentication using X.509 certificates. A
prerequisite of the latter is the availability of a Certification
Authority (CA) to issue suitable certificates. Although this can be
a challenging requirement in certain application scenarios, it is
worth noting that there exist open-source tools (e.g., [OpenSSL])
that can be used to set up and operate an application-specific CA.
By default, the HC Proxy MUST authenticate all incoming requests
prior to forwarding them to the CoAP server. This default behavior
MAY be explicitly disabled by an administrator.
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The following subparagraphs categorize and discuss a set of specific
security issues related to the translation, caching, and forwarding
functionality exposed by an HC Proxy.
10.1. Multicast
Multicast requests impose a non-trivial cost on the constrained
network and endpoints and might be exploited as a DoS attack vector
(see also Section 10.2). From a privacy perspective, they can be
used to gather detailed information about the resources hosted in the
constrained network. For example, an outsider that is able to
successfully query the "/.well-known/core" resource could obtain a
comprehensive list of the target's home appliances and devices. From
a security perspective, they can be used to carry out a network
reconnaissance attack to gather information about possible
vulnerabilities that could be exploited at a later point in time.
For these reasons, it is RECOMMENDED that requests to multicast
resources are access controlled with a default-deny policy. It is
RECOMMENDED that the requestor of a multicast resource be strongly
authenticated. If privacy and/or security are first class
requirements, for example, whenever the HTTP request transits through
the public Internet, the request SHOULD be transported over a
mutually authenticated and encrypted TLS connection.
10.2. Traffic Overflow
Due to the typically constrained nature of CoAP nodes, particular
attention should be given to the implementation of traffic reduction
mechanisms (see Section 8.1), because an inefficient proxy
implementation can be targeted by unconstrained Internet attackers.
Bandwidth or complexity involved in such attacks is very low.
An amplification attack to the constrained network may be triggered
by a multicast request generated by a single HTTP request that is
mapped to a CoAP multicast resource, as discussed in Section 11.3 of
[RFC 7252].
The risk likelihood of this amplification technique is higher than an
amplification attack carried out by a malicious constrained device
(e.g., ICMPv6 flooding, like Packet Too Big, or Parameter Problem on
a multicast destination [RFC 4732]) since it does not require direct
access to the constrained network.
The feasibility of this attack, which disrupts availability of the
targeted CoAP server, can be limited by access controlling the
exposed multicast resources, so that only known/authorized users can
access such URIs.
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 29
RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
10.3. Handling Secured Exchanges
An HTTP request can be sent to the HC Proxy over a secured
connection. However, there may not always exist a secure connection
mapping to CoAP. For example, a secure distribution method for
multicast traffic is complex and may not be implemented (see
[RFC 7390]).
An HC Proxy should implement rules for security context translations.
For example, all 'https' unicast requests are translated to 'coaps'
requests, or 'https' requests are translated to unsecured 'coap'
requests. Another rule could specify the security policy and
parameters used for Datagram Transport Layer Security (DTLS) sessions
[RFC 7925]. Such rules will largely depend on the application and
network context in which the HC Proxy operates. These rules should
be configurable.
It is RECOMMENDED that, by default, accessing a 'coaps' URI is only
allowed from a corresponding 'https' URI.
By default, an HC Proxy SHOULD reject any secured CoAP client request
(i.e., one with a 'coaps' scheme) if there is no configured security
policy mapping. This recommendation may be relaxed in case the
destination network is believed to be secured by other means.
Assuming that CoAP nodes are isolated behind a firewall as in the HC
Proxy deployment shown in Figure 1, the HC Proxy may be configured to
translate the incoming HTTPS request using plain CoAP (NoSec mode).
10.4. URI Mapping
The following risks related to the URI mapping described in Section 5
and its use by an HC Proxy have been identified:
DoS attack on the constrained/CoAP network.
Mitigation: by default, deny any Target CoAP URI whose authority
is (or maps to) a multicast address. Then explicitly whitelist
multicast resources/authorities that are allowed to be
dereferenced. See also Section 8.4.
Leaking information on the constrained/CoAP network resources and
topology.
Mitigation: by default, deny any Target CoAP URI (especially
"/.well-known/core" is a resource to be protected), and then
explicitly whitelist resources that are allowed to be seen by
clients outside the constrained network.
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 30
RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
The CoAP target resource is totally transparent from outside the
constrained network.
Mitigation: implement an HTTPS-only interface, which makes the
Target CoAP URI totally opaque to a passive attacker outside the
constrained network.
11. References
11.1. Normative References
[RFC 2119] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119,
DOI 10.17487/RFC 2119, March 1997,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 2119>.
[RFC 3986] Berners-Lee, T., Fielding, R., and L. Masinter, "Uniform
Resource Identifier (URI): Generic Syntax", STD 66,
RFC 3986, DOI 10.17487/RFC 3986, January 2005,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 3986>.
[RFC 4279] Eronen, P., Ed. and H. Tschofenig, Ed., "Pre-Shared Key
Ciphersuites for Transport Layer Security (TLS)",
RFC 4279, DOI 10.17487/RFC 4279, December 2005,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 4279>.
[RFC 5234] Crocker, D., Ed. and P. Overell, "Augmented BNF for Syntax
Specifications: ABNF", STD 68, RFC 5234,
DOI 10.17487/RFC 5234, January 2008,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 5234>.
[RFC 5246] Dierks, T. and E. Rescorla, "The Transport Layer Security
(TLS) Protocol Version 1.2", RFC 5246,
DOI 10.17487/RFC 5246, August 2008,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 5246>.
[RFC 6570] Gregorio, J., Fielding, R., Hadley, M., Nottingham, M.,
and D. Orchard, "URI Template", RFC 6570,
DOI 10.17487/RFC 6570, March 2012,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 6570>.
[RFC 6690] Shelby, Z., "Constrained RESTful Environments (CoRE) Link
Format", RFC 6690, DOI 10.17487/RFC 6690, August 2012,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 6690>.
[RFC 7230] Fielding, R., Ed. and J. Reschke, Ed., "Hypertext Transfer
Protocol (HTTP/1.1): Message Syntax and Routing",
RFC 7230, DOI 10.17487/RFC 7230, June 2014,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 7230>.
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 31
RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
[RFC 7231] Fielding, R., Ed. and J. Reschke, Ed., "Hypertext Transfer
Protocol (HTTP/1.1): Semantics and Content", RFC 7231,
DOI 10.17487/RFC 7231, June 2014,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 7231>.
[RFC 7232] Fielding, R., Ed. and J. Reschke, Ed., "Hypertext Transfer
Protocol (HTTP/1.1): Conditional Requests", RFC 7232,
DOI 10.17487/RFC 7232, June 2014,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 7232>.
[RFC 7235] Fielding, R., Ed. and J. Reschke, Ed., "Hypertext Transfer
Protocol (HTTP/1.1): Authentication", RFC 7235,
DOI 10.17487/RFC 7235, June 2014,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 7235>.
[RFC 7252] Shelby, Z., Hartke, K., and C. Bormann, "The Constrained
Application Protocol (CoAP)", RFC 7252,
DOI 10.17487/RFC 7252, June 2014,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 7252>.
[RFC 7641] Hartke, K., "Observing Resources in the Constrained
Application Protocol (CoAP)", RFC 7641,
DOI 10.17487/RFC 7641, September 2015,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 7641>.
[RFC 7959] Bormann, C. and Z. Shelby, Ed., "Block-Wise Transfers in
the Constrained Application Protocol (CoAP)", RFC 7959,
DOI 10.17487/RFC 7959, August 2016,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 7959>.
11.2. Informative References
[CoRE-JSON-CBOR]
Li, K., Rahman, A., and C. Bormann, "Representing CoRE
Formats in JSON and CBOR", Work in Progress, draft-ietf-
core-links-json-06, July 2016.
[CoRE-RD] Shelby, Z., Koster, M., Bormann, C., and P. Stok, "CoRE
Resource Directory", Work in Progress, draft-ietf-core-
resource-directory-09, October 2016.
[Fielding] Fielding, R., "Architectural Styles and the Design of
Network-based Software Architectures", PhD
Dissertation, University of California, Irvine,
ISBN 0-599-87118-0, 2000.
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 32
RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
[OpenSSL] The OpenSSL Project, , "ca - sample minimal CA
application", 2000-2016,
<https://www.openssl.org/docs/manmaster/man1/ca.html>.
[RFC 2616] Fielding, R., Gettys, J., Mogul, J., Frystyk, H.,
Masinter, L., Leach, P., and T. Berners-Lee, "Hypertext
Transfer Protocol -- HTTP/1.1", RFC 2616,
DOI 10.17487/RFC 2616, June 1999,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 2616>.
[RFC 2663] Srisuresh, P. and M. Holdrege, "IP Network Address
Translator (NAT) Terminology and Considerations",
RFC 2663, DOI 10.17487/RFC 2663, August 1999,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 2663>.
[RFC 3040] Cooper, I., Melve, I., and G. Tomlinson, "Internet Web
Replication and Caching Taxonomy", RFC 3040,
DOI 10.17487/RFC 3040, January 2001,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 3040>.
[RFC 4732] Handley, M., Ed., Rescorla, E., Ed., and IAB, "Internet
Denial-of-Service Considerations", RFC 4732,
DOI 10.17487/RFC 4732, December 2006,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 4732>.
[RFC 6454] Barth, A., "The Web Origin Concept", RFC 6454,
DOI 10.17487/RFC 6454, December 2011,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 6454>.
[RFC 7049] Bormann, C. and P. Hoffman, "Concise Binary Object
Representation (CBOR)", RFC 7049, DOI 10.17487/RFC 7049,
October 2013, <http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 7049>.
[RFC 7228] Bormann, C., Ersue, M., and A. Keranen, "Terminology for
Constrained-Node Networks", RFC 7228,
DOI 10.17487/RFC 7228, May 2014,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 7228>.
[RFC 7390] Rahman, A., Ed. and E. Dijk, Ed., "Group Communication for
the Constrained Application Protocol (CoAP)", RFC 7390,
DOI 10.17487/RFC 7390, October 2014,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 7390>.
[RFC 7925] Tschofenig, H., Ed. and T. Fossati, "Transport Layer
Security (TLS) / Datagram Transport Layer Security (DTLS)
Profiles for the Internet of Things", RFC 7925,
DOI 10.17487/RFC 7925, July 2016,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 7925>.
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 33
RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
[W3C.REC-html5-20141028]
Hickson, I., Berjon, R., Faulkner, S., Leithead, T.,
Navara, E., O'Connor, E., and S. Pfeiffer, "HTML5", World
Wide Web Consortium Recommendation REC-html5-20141028,
October 2014,
<http://www.w3.org/TR/2014/REC-html5-20141028>.
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 34
RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
Appendix A. Media Type Mapping Source Code
#!/usr/bin/env python
import unittest
import re
class CoAPContentFormatRegistry(object):
"""Map an Internet media type (and optional inherent encoding) to a
CoAP Content-Format.
"""
TEXT_PLAIN = 0
LINK_FORMAT = 40
XML = 41
OCTET_STREAM = 42
EXI = 47
JSON = 50
CBOR = 60
GROUP_JSON = 256
# http://www.iana.org/assignments/core-parameters
# as of 2016/10/24.
LOOKUP_TABLE = {
("text/plain;charset=utf-8", None): TEXT_PLAIN,
("application/link-format", None): LINK_FORMAT,
("application/xml", None): XML,
("application/octet-stream", None): OCTET_STREAM,
("application/exi", None): EXI,
("application/json", None): JSON,
("application/cbor", None): CBOR,
("application/coap-group+json", "utf-8"): GROUP_JSON,
}
def lookup(self, media_type, encoding):
"""Return the CoAP Content-Format matching the supplied
media type (and optional encoding), or None if no
match can be found."""
return CoAPContentFormatRegistry.LOOKUP_TABLE.get(
(media_type, encoding), None)
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 35
RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
class LooseMediaTypeMapper(object):
# Order matters in this table: more specific types have higher rank
# compared to less specific types.
# This code only performs a shallow validation of acceptable
# characters and assumes overall validation of the media type and
# subtype has been done beforehand.
LOOKUP_TABLE = [
(re.compile("application/.+\+xml$"), "application/xml"),
(re.compile("application/.+\+json$"), "application/json"),
(re.compile("application/.+\+cbor$"), "application/cbor"),
(re.compile("text/xml$"), "application/xml"),
(re.compile("text/[a-z\.\-\+]+$"), "text/plain;charset=utf-8"),
(re.compile("[a-z]+/[a-z\.\-\+]+$"), "application/octet-stream")
]
def lookup(self, media_type):
"""Return the best loose media type match available using
the contents of LOOKUP_TABLE."""
for entry in LooseMediaTypeMapper.LOOKUP_TABLE:
if entry[0].match(media_type) is not None:
return entry[1]
return None
def mt2cf(media_type, encoding=None,
coap_cf_registry=CoAPContentFormatRegistry(),
loose_mapper=None):
"""Return a CoAP Content-Format given an Internet media type and
its optional encoding. The current (as of 2016/10/24) "CoAP
Content-Formats" registry is supplied by default. An optional
'loose-mapping' implementation can be supplied by the caller."""
assert media_type is not None
assert coap_cf_registry is not None
# Lookup the "CoAP Content-Formats" registry
content_format = coap_cf_registry.lookup(media_type, encoding)
# If an exact match is not found and a loose mapper has been
# supplied, try to use it to get a media type with which to
# retry the "CoAP Content-Formats" registry lookup.
if content_format is None and loose_mapper is not None:
content_format = coap_cf_registry.lookup(
loose_mapper.lookup(media_type), encoding)
return content_format
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 36
RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
class TestMT2CF(unittest.TestCase):
def testMissingContentType(self):
with self.assertRaises(AssertionError):
mt2cf(None)
def testMissingContentFormatRegistry(self):
with self.assertRaises(AssertionError):
mt2cf(None, coap_cf_registry=None)
def testTextPlain(self):
self.assertEqual(mt2cf("text/plain;charset=utf-8"),
CoAPContentFormatRegistry.TEXT_PLAIN)
def testLinkFormat(self):
self.assertEqual(mt2cf("application/link-format"),
CoAPContentFormatRegistry.LINK_FORMAT)
def testXML(self):
self.assertEqual(mt2cf("application/xml"),
CoAPContentFormatRegistry.XML)
def testOctetStream(self):
self.assertEqual(mt2cf("application/octet-stream"),
CoAPContentFormatRegistry.OCTET_STREAM)
def testEXI(self):
self.assertEqual(mt2cf("application/exi"),
CoAPContentFormatRegistry.EXI)
def testJSON(self):
self.assertEqual(mt2cf("application/json"),
CoAPContentFormatRegistry.JSON)
def testCBOR(self):
self.assertEqual(mt2cf("application/cbor"),
CoAPContentFormatRegistry.CBOR)
def testCoAPGroupJSON(self):
self.assertEqual(mt2cf("application/coap-group+json",
"utf-8"),
CoAPContentFormatRegistry.GROUP_JSON)
def testUnknownMediaType(self):
self.assertFalse(mt2cf("unknown/media-type"))
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 37
RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
def testLooseXML1(self):
self.assertEqual(
mt2cf(
"application/somesubtype+xml",
loose_mapper=LooseMediaTypeMapper()),
CoAPContentFormatRegistry.XML)
def testLooseXML2(self):
self.assertEqual(
mt2cf(
"text/xml",
loose_mapper=LooseMediaTypeMapper()),
CoAPContentFormatRegistry.XML)
def testLooseJSON(self):
self.assertEqual(
mt2cf(
"application/somesubtype+json",
loose_mapper=LooseMediaTypeMapper()),
CoAPContentFormatRegistry.JSON)
def testLooseCBOR(self):
self.assertEqual(
mt2cf(
"application/somesubtype+cbor",
loose_mapper=LooseMediaTypeMapper()),
CoAPContentFormatRegistry.CBOR)
def testLooseText(self):
self.assertEqual(
mt2cf(
"text/somesubtype",
loose_mapper=LooseMediaTypeMapper()),
CoAPContentFormatRegistry.TEXT_PLAIN)
def testLooseUnknown(self):
self.assertEqual(
mt2cf(
"application/somesubtype-of-some-sort+format",
loose_mapper=LooseMediaTypeMapper()),
CoAPContentFormatRegistry.OCTET_STREAM)
def testLooseInvalidStartsWithNonAlpha(self):
self.assertFalse(
mt2cf(
" application/somesubtype",
loose_mapper=LooseMediaTypeMapper()))
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 38
RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
def testLooseInvalidEndsWithUnexpectedChar(self):
self.assertFalse(
mt2cf(
"application/somesubtype ",
loose_mapper=LooseMediaTypeMapper()))
def testLooseInvalidUnexpectedCharInTheMiddle(self):
self.assertFalse(
mt2cf(
"application /somesubtype",
loose_mapper=LooseMediaTypeMapper()))
def testLooseInvalidNoSubType1(self):
self.assertFalse(
mt2cf(
"application",
loose_mapper=LooseMediaTypeMapper()))
def testLooseInvalidNoSubType2(self):
self.assertFalse(
mt2cf(
"application/",
loose_mapper=LooseMediaTypeMapper()))
if __name__ == "__main__":
unittest.main(verbosity=2)
Acknowledgments
An initial version of Table 2 in Section 7 has been provided in
revision -05 of the CoRE CoAP I-D. Special thanks to Peter van der
Stok for countless comments and discussions on this document that
contributed to its current structure and text.
Thanks to Abhijan Bhattacharyya, Alexey Melnikov, Brian Frank,
Carsten Bormann, Christian Amsuess, Christian Groves, Cullen
Jennings, Dorothy Gellert, Francesco Corazza, Francis Dupont, Hannes
Tschofenig, Jaime Jimenez, Kathleen Moriarty, Kepeng Li, Kerry Lynn,
Klaus Hartke, Larry Masinter, Linyi Tian, Michele Rossi, Michele
Zorzi, Nicola Bui, Peter Saint-Andre, Sean Leonard, Spencer Dawkins,
Stephen Farrell, Suresh Krishnan, and Zach Shelby for helpful
comments and discussions that have shaped the document.
The research leading to these results has received funding from the
European Community's Seventh Framework Programme [FP7/2007-2013]
under grant agreement n.251557.
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 39
RFC 8075 HTTP-to-CoAP Mapping February 2017
Authors' Addresses
Angelo P. Castellani
University of Padova
Via Gradenigo 6/B
Padova 35131
Italy
Email: angelo@castellani.net
Salvatore Loreto
Ericsson
Hirsalantie 11
Jorvas 02420
Finland
Email: salvatore.loreto@ericsson.com
Akbar Rahman
InterDigital Communications, LLC
1000 Sherbrooke Street West
Montreal H3A 3G4
Canada
Phone: +1 514 585 0761
Email: Akbar.Rahman@InterDigital.com
Thomas Fossati
Nokia
3 Ely Road
Milton, Cambridge CB24 6DD
United Kingdom
Email: thomas.fossati@nokia.com
Esko Dijk
Philips Lighting
High Tech Campus 7
Eindhoven 5656 AE
The Netherlands
Email: esko.dijk@philips.com
Castellani, et al. Standards Track PAGE 40
RFC TOTAL SIZE: 86096 bytes
PUBLICATION DATE: Wednesday, March 1st, 2017
LEGAL RIGHTS: The IETF Trust (see BCP 78)
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