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Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) S. Weiler Request for Comments: 5781 SPARTA, Inc. Category: Informational D. Ward ISSN: 2070-1721 Juniper

                                                            R. Housley
                                                        Vigil Security
                                                         February 2010

                        The rsync URI Scheme

Abstract

 This document specifies the rsync Uniform Resource Identifier (URI)
 scheme.

Status of This Memo

 This document is not an Internet Standards Track specification; it is
 published for informational purposes.

 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).  Not all documents
 approved by the IESG are a candidate for any level of Internet
 Standard; see 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/rfc5781.

Copyright Notice

 Copyright (c) 2010 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.

Weiler, et al. Informational [Page 1]  RFC 5781 rsync URI February 2010

1. Introduction

 URIs were previously defined in RFC 2396, which was obsoleted by RFC
 3986 [RFC3986].  The procedures for registering new URI schemes are
 defined in RFC 4395 [RFC4395].  The rsync utility provides fast
 incremental file transfer [rsync].  This document defines a URI
 scheme for rsync.

2. rsync URI registration

 This section contains the registration template for the rsync URI
 scheme in accordance with RFC 4395 [RFC4395].  This URI scheme is for
 the rsync protocol using TCP as the transport protocol.  Other
 transports, such as rsync over SSH, are not supported by this URI
 scheme.

 URI scheme name: rsync

 Status: provisional

 URI scheme syntax: An rsync URI describes a source or destination for
 the rsync application including a hostname, path, and optional user
 and port.  The generic form of the rsync URI is:

 rsync://[user@]host[:PORT]/Source

 The rsync URI follows the general syntax from RFC 3986 and is defined
 by the following ABNF [RFC5234]:

    rsyncuri        = "rsync:" hier-part
                      ; See RFC 3986 for the definition
                      ; of hier-part

 URI scheme semantics: An rsync URI may be used as either a source or
 destination for the rsync application.  If the port is not specified,
 it defaults to 873.

 Encoding considerations: Since the rsync URI is defined using
 standard elements from RFC 3986, no special encoding considerations
 are present.

 Applications/protocols that use this URI scheme name: The only
 application that uses rsync URIs is rsync.

 Interoperability considerations: Since only one application is
 expected to make use of rsync URIs, this URI scheme is expected to
 have few interoperability concerns.

Weiler, et al. Informational [Page 2]  RFC 5781 rsync URI February 2010

 Security considerations: Section 7 of RFC 3986 describes general
 security considerations for URI schemes.  The considerations about
 reliability and consistency, malicious construction, rare IP address
 formats, sensitive information, and semantic attacks all apply to
 rsync URIs.  The considerations about transcoding do not apply.
 Given how rsync is regularly used, it is expected that most
 applications will not be bothered by data accessed via a given rsync
 URI changing over time.

 Contact: Russ Housley <housley@vigilsec.com>

 Author/Change controller: Russ Housley <housley@vigilsec.com>

 References: see Section 5.

3. IANA Considerations

 IANA has registered the rsync provisional URI scheme using the
 template in Section 2.

4. Security Considerations

 Many security considerations for the usage of URIs are discussed in
 Section 7 of [RFC3986].  The considerations about reliability and
 consistency, malicious construction, rare IP address formats,
 sensitive information, and semantic attacks all apply to rsync URIs.
 The considerations about transcoding do not apply.  The rsync URI
 scheme has no particularly unique security considerations.

 The security considerations of the rsync protocol are not covered in
 this document.

5. Normative References

 [RFC3986]  Berners-Lee, T., Fielding, R., and L. Masinter, "Uniform
            Resource Identifier (URI): Generic Syntax", STD 66, RFC
            3986, January 2005.

 [RFC4395]  Hansen, T., Hardie, T., and L. Masinter, "Guidelines and
            Registration Procedures for New URI Schemes", BCP 35, RFC
            4395, February 2006.

 [RFC5234]  Crocker, D., Ed., and P. Overell, "Augmented BNF for
            Syntax Specifications: ABNF", STD 68, RFC 5234, January
            2008.

Weiler, et al. Informational [Page 3]  RFC 5781 rsync URI February 2010

6. Informative References

 [rsync]  http://rsync.samba.org/.

Authors' Addresses

 Samuel Weiler
 SPARTA, Inc.
 7110 Samuel Morse Drive
 Columbia, Maryland  21046
 US

 EMail: weiler@tislabs.com

 Dave Ward
 Juniper Networks
 1194 North Mathilda Avenue
 Sunnyvale, California  94089-1206
 US

 EMail: dward@juniper.net

 Russ Housley
 Vigil Security, LLC
 918 Spring Knoll Drive
 Herndon, Virginia  20170
 US

 EMail: housley@vigilsec.com

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