RFC 2005 (rfc2005) - Page 2 of 5
Applicability Statement for IP Mobility Support
Alternative Format: Original Text Document
RFC 2005 Mobile IP Applicability Statement October 1996 -- a topologically significant address -- to which standard IP routing mechanisms can deliver packets. The Mobile IP protocol defines the following: - an authenticated registration procedure by which a mobile node informs its home agent(s) of its care-of address(es); - an extension to ICMP Router Discovery [RFC 1256] which allows mobile nodes to discover prospective home agents and foreign agents; and - the rules for routing packets to and from mobile nodes, including the specification of one mandatory tunneling mechanism ([MIP-IPinIP]) and several optional tunneling mechanisms ([MIP-MINENC] and [RFC 1701]). 2. Applicability Mobile IP is intended to solve node mobility across changes in IP subnet. It is just as suitable for mobility across homogeneous media as it is for mobility across heterogeneous media. That is, Mobile IP facilitates node movement from one Ethernet segment to another as well as it accommodates node movement from an Ethernet segment to a wireless LAN. One can think of Mobile IP as solving the "macro" mobility management problem. It is less well suited for more "micro" mobility management applications -- for example, handoff amongst wireless transceivers, each of which covers only a very small geographic area. In this later situation, link-layer mechanisms for link maintenance (i.e. link-layer handoff) might offer faster convergence and less overhead than Mobile IP. Mobile IP scales to handle a large number of mobile nodes in the Internet. Without route optimization as described in [MIP-OPTIM], however, the home agent is a potential load point when serving many mobile nodes. When home agents become overburdened, additional home agents can be added -- and even dynamically discovered by mobile nodes -- using mechanisms defined in the Mobile IP documents. Finally, it is noted that mobile nodes are assigned (home) IP addresses largely the same way in which stationary hosts are assigned long-term IP addresses; namely, by the authority who owns them. Properly applied, Mobile IP allows mobile nodes to communicate using only their home address regardless of their current location. Mobile IP, therefore, makes no attempt to solve the problems related to local or global, IP address, renumbering. Solomon Standards Track
