ESIS(4)                   OpenBSD Programmer's Manual                  ESIS(4)

NAME
     es-is - End System to Intermediate System Routing Protocol

SYNOPSIS
     pseudo-device ether

DESCRIPTION
     The ES-IS routing protocol is used to dynamically map between ISO NSAP
     addresses and ISO SNPA addresses; to permit End and Intermediate Systems
     to learn of each other's existence; and to allow Intermediate Systems to
     inform End Systems of (potentially) better routes to use when forwarding
     NPDUs to a particular destination.

     The mapping between NSAP addresses and SNPA addresses is accomplished by
     transmitting hello PDUs between the cooperating Systems.  These PDUs are
     transmitted whenever the configuration timer expires.  When a hello PDU
     is received, the SNPA address that it conveys is stored in the routing
     table for as long as the holding time in the PDU suggests.  The default
     holding time (120 seconds) placed in the hello PDU, the configuration
     timer value, and the system type (End System or Intermediate System) may
     be changed by issuing an SIOCSSTYPE ioctl(2), which is defined in
     /sys/netiso/iso_snpac.h.

     The protocol behaves differently depending on whether the System is con-
     figured as an End System or an Intermediate System.

END SYSTEM OPERATION
     When an interface requests a mapping for an address not in the cache, the
     SNPA of any known Intermediate System is returned.  If an Intermediate
     System is not known, then the all end systems multicast address is re-
     turned.  It is assumed that the intended recipient of the NPDU will imme-
     diately transmit a hello PDU back to the originator of the NPDU.

     If an NPDU is forwarded by the End System, a redirect PDU will not be
     generated.  However, redirect PDUs received will be processed.  This pro-
     cessing consists of adding an entry in the routing table.  If the redi-
     rect is towards an Intermediate System, then an entry is made in the
     routing table as well.  The entry in the routing table will mark the NSAP
     address contained in the redirect PDU as the gateway for the destination
     system (if an NET is supplied), or will create a route with the NSAP ad-
     dress as the destination and the SNPA address (embodied as a link-level
     sockaddr) as the gateway.

     If the System is configured as an End System, it will report all the
     NSAPs that have been configured using the ifconfig command, and no oth-
     ers.  It is possible to have more than one NSAP assigned to a given in-
     terface, and it is also possible to have the same NSAP assigned to multi-
     ple interfaces.  However, any NSAP containing an NSEL that is consistent
     with the nsellength option (default one) of any interface will be accept-
     ed as an NSAP for this System.

INTERMEDIATE SYSTEM OPERATION
     When an interface requests a mapping for an address not in the routing
     table, an error is returned.

     When an NPDU is forwarded out on the same interface that the NPDU arrived
     upon, a redirect PDU is generated.

MANUAL ROUTING TABLE MODIFICATION
     To facilitate communications with systems which do not use ES-IS, one may
     add a route whose destination is a sockaddr_iso containing the NSAP in
     question, and the gateway being a link-level sockaddr, either by writing
     a special purpose program, or using the route(8) command e.g.:

     route add -iface -osi 49.0.4.8.0.2b.b.83.bf -link qe0:8.0.2b.b.83.bf

     If the System is configured as an End System and has a single network in-
     terface which does not support multicast reception, it is necessary to
     manually configure the location of an IS, using the route command in a
     similar way.  There, the destination address should be ``default''
     (spelled out literally as 7 ASCII characters), and the gateway should be
     once again be a link-level sockaddr specifying the SNPA of the IS.

SEE ALSO
     iso(4), ifconfig(8), route(8)

     End system to Intermediate system routing exchange protocol for use in
     conjunction with the Protocol for providing the connectionless-mode
     network service, ISO, 9542.

BUGS
     Redirect PDUs do not contain options from the forwarded NPDU which gener-
     ated the redirect.  The multicast address used on the 802.3 network is
     taken from the NBS December 1987 agreements.  This multicast address is
     not compatible with the 802.5 (Token Ring) multicast addresses format.
     Therefore, broadcast addresses are used on the 802.5 subnetwork.  Re-
     searchers at the University of Wisconsin are constructing an implementa-
     tion of the IS-IS routing protocol.

OpenBSD 3.0                    November 30, 1993                             2
