Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) G. Salgueiro
Request for Comments: 6466 Cisco Systems
Category: Standards Track December 2011
ISSN: 2070-1721
IANA Registration of the 'image' Media Type
for the Session Description Protocol (SDP)
Abstract
This document describes the usage of the 'image' media type and
registers it with IANA as a top-level media type for the Session
Description Protocol (SDP). This media type is primarily used by SDP
to negotiate and establish T.38 media streams.
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 5741.
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/rfc6466.
Copyright Notice
Copyright (c) 2011 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.
Salgueiro Standards Track [Page 1]
RFC 6466 'image' Media Type Registration December 2011
Table of Contents
1. Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
2. Conventions Used in This Document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
4. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
5. Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
6. References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
6.1. Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
6.2. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
1. Overview
In an earlier version of the SDP specification [RFC2327] of
packetized media types, such as those used with the Real-time
Transport Protocol (RTP) [RFC3550], share the namespace with
Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME) media types registry
[RFC4288] [RFC4289] (i.e., "MIME media types"). This is in contrast
to the latest version of the SDP specification [RFC4566], which
requested that an SDP-specific media type registry be created and
maintained by IANA. The top-level SDP media content types registered
by RFC 4566 [RFC4566] are 'audio', 'video', 'text', 'application',
and 'message'. A glaring omission from this list is the 'image'
media type.
The 'image' media type is an existing top-level MIME media type and
is widely used in SDP implementations for setting up T.38 Real-Time
Facsimile [T38] media streams. This media type is extensively
referenced by examples in ITU-T T.38 [T38] and IETF Standards Track
documents like RFC 4145 [RFC4145]. The following example shows the
media description of a T.38 media stream as commonly found in a
Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) [RFC3261] INVITE; it contains an
SDP offer for T.38 over both UDP Transport Layer (UDPTL) and TCP.
For the sake of brevity, only the SDP body of the SIP INVITE request
is displayed in this example.
Salgueiro Standards Track [Page 2]
RFC 6466 'image' Media Type Registration December 2011
v=0
o=alice 53655765 2353687637 IN IP4 pc33.example.com
s=SDP image example
c=IN IP4 192.0.2.2
t=0 0
m=image 49170 udptl t38
a=T38FaxVersion:0
a=T38MaxBitRate:14400
a=T38FaxRateManagement:transferredTCF
a=T38FaxMaxBuffer:262
a=T38FaxMaxDatagram:90
a=T38FaxUdpEC:t38UDPRedundancy
a=sendrecv
m=image 49172 tcp t38
a=T38FaxRateManagement:localTCF
The purpose of this document is to register with IANA the 'image'
media type as a top-level SDP media type. This ensures seamless
continuity with documentation that uses the 'image' MIME media type
and the previously registered MIME media sub-types like 'image/t38'
[RFC3362] that are used as SDP media descriptors for T.38 [T38].
This document complies with the request of Section 8.2.1 of RFC 4566
[RFC4566] that indicates:
The same rules should apply for media names as for top-level media
content types, and where possible the same name should be
registered for SDP as for MIME. For media other than existing
top-level media content types, a Standards Track RFC MUST be
produced for a new top-level content type to be registered, and
the registration MUST provide good justification why no existing
media name is appropriate.
2. Conventions Used in This Document
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
"SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this
document are to be interpreted as described in RFC 2119 [RFC2119].
3. IANA Considerations
IANA has registered an 'image' token in the media sub-registry of the
Session Description Protocols (SDP) Parameters registry. This
registration contains the required information elements outlined in
the SDP registration procedure defined in Section 8.2.8 of RFC 4566
[RFC4566].
Salgueiro Standards Track [Page 3]
RFC 6466 'image' Media Type Registration December 2011
(1) Contact Information:
Name: Gonzalo Salgueiro
Email: gsalguei@cisco.com
Telephone Number: (919) 392-3266
(2) Name being registered (as it will appear in SDP): image
(3) Long-form name in English: image
(4) Type of name ('media', 'proto', 'fmt', 'bwtype', 'nettype', or
'addrtype'): media
(5) Purpose of the registered name:
The 'image' media type for the Session Description Protocol
is used to describe a media stream whose content consists of
one or more separate images that require appropriate hardware
to display. The media subtype further describes the specific
format of the image. Currently, the 'image' media type for
SDP is used ubiquitously by the SIP control protocol to
establish T.38 media streams.
(6) Specification for the registered name: RFC 6466
4. Security Considerations
The 'image' media type registered by this document in the SDP
parameters registry maintained by IANA is primarily for use by the
offer/answer model of the Session Description Protocol [RFC3264] for
the negotiation and establishment of T.38 [T38] media streams using
SIP [RFC3261]. This additional SDP media type does not introduce any
security considerations beyond those detailed in Section 7 of RFC
4566 [RFC4566].
The security vulnerabilities in T.38 [T38] and its associated
transport protocols (TCP [RFC0793], UDP [RFC0768], and RTP [RFC3550])
are well documented in each of their respective specifications. The
ability to exchange images other than T.38 can expose the recipient
to potentially malicious executable code.
5. Acknowledgements
Thanks go to the chairs of the IETF Multiparty Multimedia Session
Control (MMUSIC) working group (Miguel A. Garcia and Flemming
Andreasen) for their guidance, encouragement, and the creation of the
Salgueiro Standards Track [Page 4]
RFC 6466 'image' Media Type Registration December 2011
media type registry. Special thanks to Miguel A. Garcia for his
thorough and insightful review of the many draft revisions of this
document.
This document has benefited from the discussion and review of the
MMUSIC working group, especially the detailed and thoughtful comments
and corrections of Keith Drage, Yasubumi Chimura, Kevin P. Fleming,
Bert Greevenbosch, and Gonzalo Camarillo.
The author would also like to acknowledge the considerable efforts of
Kevin P. Fleming and the members of the Fax-over-IP (FoIP) TG in the
SIP Forum that contributed to the new revision of the ITU-T T.38
Recommendation that prompted the need to register the 'image' media
type for SDP.
6. References
6.1. Normative References
[RFC2119] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, March 1997.
[RFC4566] Handley, M., Jacobson, V., and C. Perkins, "SDP: Session
Description Protocol", RFC 4566, July 2006.
6.2. Informative References
[RFC0768] Postel, J., "User Datagram Protocol", STD 6, RFC 768,
August 1980.
[RFC0793] Postel, J., "Transmission Control Protocol", STD 7,
RFC 793, September 1981.
[RFC2327] Handley, M. and V. Jacobson, "SDP: Session Description
Protocol", RFC 2327, April 1998.
[RFC3261] Rosenberg, J., Schulzrinne, H., Camarillo, G., Johnston,
A., Peterson, J., Sparks, R., Handley, M., and E.
Schooler, "SIP: Session Initiation Protocol", RFC 3261,
June 2002.
[RFC3264] Rosenberg, J. and H. Schulzrinne, "An Offer/Answer Model
with Session Description Protocol (SDP)", RFC 3264,
June 2002.
[RFC3362] Parsons, G., "Real-time Facsimile (T.38) - image/t38 MIME
Sub-type Registration", RFC 3362, August 2002.
Salgueiro Standards Track [Page 5]
RFC 6466 'image' Media Type Registration December 2011
[RFC3550] Schulzrinne, H., Casner, S., Frederick, R., and V.
Jacobson, "RTP: A Transport Protocol for Real-Time
Applications", STD 64, RFC 3550, July 2003.
[RFC4145] Yon, D. and G. Camarillo, "TCP-Based Media Transport in
the Session Description Protocol (SDP)", RFC 4145,
September 2005.
[RFC4288] Freed, N. and J. Klensin, "Media Type Specifications and
Registration Procedures", BCP 13, RFC 4288, December 2005.
[RFC4289] Freed, N. and J. Klensin, "Multipurpose Internet Mail
Extensions (MIME) Part Four: Registration Procedures",
BCP 13, RFC 4289, December 2005.
[T38] International Telecommunication Union, "Procedures for
real-time Group 3 facsimile communication over IP
Networks", ITU-T Recommendation T.38 (Pre-Published),
September 2010,
<http://www.itu.int/rec/T-REC-T.38-201009-P/en>.
Author's Address
Gonzalo Salgueiro
Cisco Systems
7200-12 Kit Creek Road
Research Triangle Park, NC 27709
US
EMail: gsalguei@cisco.com
Salgueiro Standards Track [Page 6]