Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF)                         M. Bishop
Request for Comments: 9412                                        Akamai
Category: Standards Track                                      June 2023
ISSN: 2070-1721


                    The ORIGIN Extension in HTTP/3

Abstract

  The ORIGIN frame for HTTP/2 is equally applicable to HTTP/3, but it
  needs to be separately registered.  This document describes the
  ORIGIN frame for HTTP/3.

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
  https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc9412.

Copyright Notice

  Copyright (c) 2023 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
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  to this document.  Code Components extracted from this document must
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  Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as described
  in the Revised BSD License.

Table of Contents

  1.  Introduction
    1.1.  Notational Conventions
  2.  The ORIGIN HTTP/3 Frame
    2.1.  Frame Layout
  3.  Security Considerations
  4.  IANA Considerations
  5.  References
    5.1.  Normative References
    5.2.  Informative References
  Author's Address

1.  Introduction

  Existing RFCs define extensions to HTTP/2 [HTTP/2] that remain useful
  in HTTP/3.  Appendix A.2 of [HTTP/3] describes the required updates
  for HTTP/2 frames to be used with HTTP/3.

  [ORIGIN] defines the HTTP/2 ORIGIN frame, which indicates what
  origins are available on a given connection.  It defines a single
  HTTP/2 frame type.

1.1.  Notational Conventions

  The key words "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
  BCP 14 [RFC2119] [RFC8174] when, and only when, they appear in all
  capitals, as shown here.

  The frame diagram in this document uses the format defined in
  Section 1.3 of [QUIC-TRANSPORT] to illustrate the order and size of
  fields.

2.  The ORIGIN HTTP/3 Frame

  The ORIGIN HTTP/3 frame allows a server to indicate what origin or
  origins [RFC6454] the server would like the client to consider as one
  or more members of the Origin Set (Section 2.3 of [ORIGIN]) for the
  connection within which it occurs.

  The semantics of the frame payload are identical to those of the
  HTTP/2 frame defined in [ORIGIN].  Where HTTP/2 reserves stream 0 for
  frames related to the state of the connection, HTTP/3 defines a pair
  of unidirectional streams called "control streams" for this purpose.

  Where [ORIGIN] indicates that the ORIGIN frame is sent on stream 0,
  this should be interpreted to mean the HTTP/3 control stream: that
  is, the ORIGIN frame is sent from servers to clients on the server's
  control stream.

  HTTP/3 does not define a Flags field in the generic frame layout.  As
  no flags have been defined for the ORIGIN frame, this specification
  does not define a mechanism for communicating such flags in HTTP/3.

2.1.  Frame Layout

  The ORIGIN frame has a layout that is nearly identical to the layout
  used in HTTP/2; the information is restated here for clarity.  The
  ORIGIN frame type is 0x0c (decimal 12), as in HTTP/2.  The payload
  contains zero or more instances of the Origin-Entry field.

  HTTP/3 Origin-Entry {
    Origin-Len (16),
    ASCII-Origin (..),
  }

  HTTP/3 ORIGIN Frame {
    Type (i) = 0x0c,
    Length (i),
    Origin-Entry (..) ...,
  }

                      Figure 1: ORIGIN Frame Layout

  An Origin-Entry is a length-delimited string.  Specifically, it
  contains two fields:

  Origin-Len:  An unsigned, 16-bit integer indicating the length, in
     octets, of the ASCII-Origin field.

  ASCII-Origin:  An OPTIONAL sequence of characters containing the
     ASCII serialization of an origin ([RFC6454], Section 6.2) that the
     sender asserts this connection is or could be authoritative for.

3.  Security Considerations

  This document introduces no new security considerations beyond those
  discussed in [ORIGIN] and [HTTP/3].

4.  IANA Considerations

  This document registers a frame type in the "HTTP/3 Frame Types"
  registry defined by [HTTP/3], located at
  <https://www.iana.org/assignments/http3-parameters/>.

  Value:  0x0c
  Frame Type:  ORIGIN
  Status:  permanent
  Reference:  Section 2
  Date:  2023-03-14
  Change Controller:  IETF
  Contact:  HTTP WG <[email protected]>

5.  References

5.1.  Normative References

  [HTTP/2]   Thomson, M., Ed. and C. Benfield, Ed., "HTTP/2", RFC 9113,
             DOI 10.17487/RFC9113, June 2022,
             <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc9113>.

  [HTTP/3]   Bishop, M., Ed., "HTTP/3", RFC 9114, DOI 10.17487/RFC9114,
             June 2022, <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc9114>.

  [ORIGIN]   Nottingham, M. and E. Nygren, "The ORIGIN HTTP/2 Frame",
             RFC 8336, DOI 10.17487/RFC8336, March 2018,
             <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc8336>.

  [RFC2119]  Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
             Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119,
             DOI 10.17487/RFC2119, March 1997,
             <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc2119>.

  [RFC8174]  Leiba, B., "Ambiguity of Uppercase vs Lowercase in RFC
             2119 Key Words", BCP 14, RFC 8174, DOI 10.17487/RFC8174,
             May 2017, <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc8174>.

5.2.  Informative References

  [QUIC-TRANSPORT]
             Iyengar, J., Ed. and M. Thomson, Ed., "QUIC: A UDP-Based
             Multiplexed and Secure Transport", RFC 9000,
             DOI 10.17487/RFC9000, May 2021,
             <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc9000>.

  [RFC6454]  Barth, A., "The Web Origin Concept", RFC 6454,
             DOI 10.17487/RFC6454, December 2011,
             <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc6454>.

Author's Address

  Mike Bishop
  Akamai
  Email: [email protected]