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Text File | 1987-05-17 | 17.9 KB | 416 lines

MEGAlink A File Transfer Protocol Specifications By: Paul Meiners P&M Software Company 9350 Country Creek #30 Houston, Texas 77036 April 18, 1987 Acknowledgements ---------------- I would like to acknowledge the work of those who have done this before me. First, Chuck Forsburg, for his never ending quest for speed and reliability. Second, Ward Christensen, whose ideas are the genesis of this whole branch of file transfer technology. Third, Peter Boswell, for showing me the way to a network friendly protocol. Last, Tom Jennings, for the work he did on Fido and the Telink protocol, which introduced the "link" style header record, now used by all "link" type protocols. For those that are not aware, these pioneers are responsible for the following work: Ward Christensen ______________ Xmodem. Tom Jennings __________________ Fido, Telink. Chuck Forsburg ________________ Ymodem, Ymodem Batch, Zmodem. Peter Boswell _________________ WXmodem. Why Another Protocol? --------------------- In many respects, the design of a protocol has become a discussion between the above mentioned pioneers, each building on the work of the other. Each has perceived a weakness in the protocols that have gone before and sought to improve the art. And that is the most elegant reason for a new protocol, to advance the art. I won't bother with a discussion of the merits of Xmodem. Others have done that far better than I could. Let me address the more modern variations. These are my opinions, based on experience and reading the literature. Zmodem - The ideal protocol. Highly reliable and fast. Only failing is that the cost of implementation is high. Ymodem - Very fast, but not network friendly. Also leaves something to be desired on the reliability front. Error correction is slow. WXmodem - Fast and network friendly. However, several questions exist with regard to reliability. So, it our goal to design and implement a protocol that meets or exceeds the following criteria: 1. Fast. Efficency must exceed 95% on average basis. 2. Reliable. Known defects in prior protocols must be corrected. 3. Inexpensive. Implementation cost must be low. How Do We Do It? ---------------- Let us address these issues in reverse sequence. COST OF IMPLEMENTATION ---------------------- By closely modeling the protocol after Xmodem, we hope to reduce cost of implementation. This may be a vain effort, because implementation of any high performance protocol requires a certain degree of complexity. RELIABILITY ----------- To improve the reliability of the protocol, we have choosen to use the new CRC-32 technology. The algorithm for this procedure will be given later in this document. Also, the Ack/Nak packets will be composed of 3 bytes, as was done in the SEAlink protocol. Like WXmodem we will honor all network XOFF signals at the transmitter end. SPEED ----- Several things are going to be done to improve speed. First, the block size will be increased from 128 to 512 bytes. This reduces the number of envelope characters. Like Zmodem, MEGAlink will be a full streaming protocol, thus eliminating the turn-around time involved with Xmodem and Ymodem. Some definitions ---------------- Description Character Decimal Control Char ----------- --------- ------- ------------ XON ................... DC1 ............... 17 ............ ^Q XOFF .................. DC3 ............... 19 ............ ^S Acknowledge ........... ACK ............... 6 ............. ^F Negative Acknowledge .. NAK ............... 21 ............ ^U End of File ........... EOT ............... 4 ............. ^D Start of Header ....... SOH ............... 1 ............. ^A MegaLink Block Id ..... EM ................ 25 ............ ^Y Request Status ........ RS ................ 30 ............ ^^ Cancel ................ CAN ............... 24 ............ ^X Synchronize ........... SYN ............... 22 ............ ^V Data Link Escape ...... DLE ............... 16 ............ ^P CP/M EOF .............. SUB ............... 26 ............ ^Z Receiver discipline ------------------- The receive side of a MEGAlink transfer has three possible packets it can use. Each is three characters in length as follows: Byte No. Content -------- ------- 1 Ack/Nak/'C'. No other character may appear. 2 Packet number. 0 thru 255. 3 Complement of packet number, i.e. (Pkt# XOR 255). The 'C' packet is sent only at the start of each file transfer. It is sent by the receiver at 5 second intervals, until the transmitter begins. After that it is not used again until the next file is begun, or the next session is begun, if only 1 file is transmitted. The Nak packet is used to request the retransmission of the specified packet. The Ack packet is used to indicate the highest packet received without error. Normally, the receiver remains quiet. The only time packets are required of the receiver are at the beginning of the transfer, as outlined below, and upon receipt of an RS character, the Request Status character. The receiver must respond to the RS character with an Ack packet, reflecting the highest block received in without error. Of course, the receiver should send a Nak packet whenever a block is received with an error condition. Note, that to maintain network friendliness, no packet may contain a XON or XOFF character. These characters must be sent as two characters, first a DLE, followed by the folded XON or XOFF. Characters are folded by XOR'ing them with decimal 64. This scheme requires that the DLE character is escaped and folded in the same manner. Transmitter discipline ---------------------- The transmitter can do four different things: 1) Send a header block. Contains file name and other information about the file. 2) Send a data block. A data block contains 512 bytes of data. 3) Send an RS character, forces receiver to Ack the highest packet he has received without error. 4) Send an EOT character, signals end-of-file to the receiver. Data blocks are sent without pause. The transmitter should have enough buffers to cover the turn-around delay, so that any block the receiver may Nak will still be available in memory for retransmission. Note, that to maintain network friendliness, no packet may contain a XON or XOFF character. These characters must be sent as two characters, first a DLE, followed by the folded XON or XOFF. Characters are folded by XOR'ing them with decimal 64. This scheme requires that the DLE character is escaped and folded in the same manner. Typical transmit/receive dialog: -------------------------------- Transmitter Receiver Description ----------- -------- ----------- C 00 FF opening Nak. SOH 00 FF header[128] CRC CRC header block sent, using CRC-16. ACK 00 FF Ack of header block. EM 01 FE data[512] CRC CRC CRC CRC file transmitted in one EM 02 FD data[512] CRC CRC CRC CRC or more data blocks, EM 03 FC data[512] CRC CRC CRC CRC using CRC-32. EM 04 FB data[512] CRC CRC CRC CRC RS transmit requests status. ACK 04 FB receive replies to RS. EOT end-of-file sent. ACK 04 FB Ack sent for end-of-file. C 00 FF opening Nak. EOT end-of-batch sent. ACK 04 FB Ack sent for end-of-batch. If necessary, the last data block can be padded with CP/M EOF characters. Note: all CRC bytes are transmitted from high to low order, NOT in the more usual byte-reversed format. At the end of the transaction, the "opening Nak" is repeated by the receiver. This is to allow for batch transmission, if more than one file were to be sent the transmitter would pick-up and start by sending the next header block and the transaction would continue from that point as shown. The format of the header block conforms to the standard "link" format. Established by Tom Jennings when he designed the Telink protocol, also used by the SEAlink protocol. Byte Offset Length Content ----------- ------ ------- 0 4 Original file length. Integer in byte reversed format. 4 4 Date and time file was last mofified, in seconds since 1979. Same format DOS uses in the directory entry. 8 17 Original file name, as a null terminated string. 25 15 Name of transmitting program, as a null terminated string. 40 88 Null filler and expansion area. CRC Calculator -------------- The following routines demonstrate the technique used to calculate CRC's, both 16 & 32 bit varieties, used in MEGAlink. The code is written in Turbo PASCAL. { Global Variables } TYPE ARRAY512 = RECORD Len : INTEGER; LongString : ARRAY[1..512] OF CHAR; END; STRING128 = STRING[128]; VAR crc_input : INTEGER; { 2 byte integer format } crc_reg_lo : INTEGER; crc_reg_hi : INTEGER; PROCEDURE ccitt_crc16_calc; { CRC-16 } BEGIN inline( $8B/$1E/crc_reg_hi ); { mov bx,crc_reg_hi } inline( $B9/>$08 ); { mov cx,8 } inline( $A1/crc_input ); { mov ax,crc_input } inline( $D0/$D0 ); { u1: rcl al,1 } inline( $D1/$D3 ); { rcl bx,1 } inline( $73/$04 ); { jnc u2 } inline( $81/$F3/$1021 ); { xor bx,1021h } inline( $E2/$F4 ); { u2: loop u1 } inline( $89/$1E/crc_reg_hi ); { mov crc_reg_hi,bx } END; PROCEDURE ccitt_crc32_calc; { CRC-32 } BEGIN inline( $8B/$1E/crc_reg_lo ); { mov bx,crc_reg_lo } inline( $8B/$16/crc_reg_hi ); { mov dx,crc_reg_hi } inline( $B9/>$08 ); { mov cx,8 } inline( $A1/crc_input ); { mov ax,crc_input } inline( $D0/$D8 ); { u1: rcr al,1 } inline( $D1/$DA ); { rcr dx,1 } inline( $D1/$DB ); { rcr bx,1 } inline( $73/$08 ); { jnc u2 } inline( $81/$F3/$8320 ); { xor bx,8320h } inline( $81/$F2/$EDB8 ); { xor dx,EDB8h } inline( $E2/$EE ); { u2: loop u1 } inline( $89/$1E/crc_reg_lo ); { mov crc_reg_lo,bx } inline( $89/$16/crc_reg_hi ); { mov crc_reg_hi,dx } END; PROCEDURE calc_crc32(VAR cs : ARRAY512); VAR i : INTEGER; BEGIN (* Note: this routine calculates a 32 bit CRC based on the CCITT polynomial. The result is stored in the crc register, variables crc_reg_hi & crc_reg_lo. *) crc_reg_hi:=0; crc_reg_lo:=0; WITH cs DO BEGIN FOR i:=1 TO Len DO BEGIN crc_input:=ORD(LongString[i]); ccitt_crc32_calc; END; END; crc_input:=0; ccitt_crc32_calc; ccitt_crc32_calc; ccitt_crc32_calc; ccitt_crc32_calc; END; PROCEDURE calc_crc16(VAR cs : STRING128); VAR i : INTEGER; BEGIN (* Note: this routine calculates a 16 bit CRC based on the CCITT polynomial. The result is stored in the crc register, variable crc_reg_hi. *) crc_reg_hi:=0; crc_reg_lo:=0; FOR i:=1 TO Length(cs) DO BEGIN crc_input:=ORD(cs[i]); ccitt_crc16_calc; END; crc_input:=0; ccitt_crc16_calc; ccitt_crc16_calc; END; Buffer Management ----------------- It is the responsibility of the transmitter to have enough buffer space to cover the Nak turn-around time at a particular baud rate. Otherwise, in full stream mode, the receiver may Nak for a block that is not available. For example, at 2400 baud, assuming a turn-around delay of 6 seconds, the transmitter should have at least room for 4 blocks in his buffer area. This in my opinion, would be cutting it TOO CLOSE, I would recommend a margin of at least 2 times or more. In GT PowerComm, the first program to implement MEGAlink, we have a ring buffer of 32 blocks. This is very easy to use, because the the Nak'ed block numbers can be AND'ed with $1F to produce the buffer number. At 2400 baud, 32 blocks in the buffer amounts to more than 60 seconds. This gives the receive side ample time to turn-around any Nak. Notice that at higher baud rates, the time margin shrinks. For example, at 9600 baud, the time margin for 32 blocks shrinks to about 14 seconds. This would probably be fine for a direct connect, but would not be good over a network such as PC Pursuit. (This is not very important now, PC Pursuit is barely scratching the surface of 2400 baud at this time, 4/20/87.) At these higher baud rates, the transmitter must use flow control techniques to insure that an adequate time margin is maintained. This can be done by issuing an RS, Request Status, command to the receive side. The receiver should reply with an Ack packet indicating the last good packet received. The transmitter should wait for reception of this Ack prior to continuing the dialog. In effect this is a self-imposed flow control. The transmitter must be smart enough to recognize the need for such, based on the baud rate and available buffer space. Theoretically, if enough buffer space was available to the transmitter, it could continue to stream at any baud rate. Error Corrections Procedure --------------------------- When the receiver detects an error, it must immediately send a Nak packet with the offending packet # within. Then the receiver dumps the contents of the serial port input buffer and waits for the requested packet. The transmitter will not usually be able to respond immediately, so the receiver must expect packets with higher than expected packet #'s, until the requested packet arrives. These extra packets should be disgarded without comment by receiver. The transmitter, upon receipt of a Nak, will immediately dump the contents of the serial port output buffer and resend the requested packet. At this point, due to the probability of a loss-of-sync error, which cannot be recovered, the send and receive side now drop to start-stop mode to correct the error. In other words, the receiver must Ack a packet that he receives in good shape after a prior Nak has been sent for the packet. The sender will not restart the stream of packets until this Ack has been received. This prevents any chance for loss-of-sync at this juncture. Also important to recognize is that the receive side of the transfer must have good code to find the start of a packet. It will have a fairly unique signature, i.e. the character EM followed by two characters that are the complements of each other. Especially considering the fact that the receiver is looking for a particular packet at this point, the occurence of a false signature is unlikely. The question of how to handle packets arriving from the sender that are them- selves in error has not been addressed. It is true however, that the trans- mitter will respond to any Nak. If the transmitter fails to get a good Nak the receiver will continue to Nak, until the requested block is received. This procedure works in practice, however there may well be a more elegant solution. For example, the transmitter, upon receipt of a faulty Nak, could simply wait for the receiver to resend the Nak. Of course, the transmitter could also send an RS, request status, command to the receiver, which could be interpreted in a Nakking situation as a "nak" to the "nak". This should cause the receiver to resend the Nak. GT implements the "resend-and-see" approach, this is the most direct and usually the best. Even if the Nak is faulty, GT will choose from the 16 buffers and send a block. If the block is too high or too low, the receiver will Nak again. This type of dialog usually leads to a resolution of the error condition, on all but the worst lines. Naturally, even the best protocols fail on the worst lines!