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+.. SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0
+
+====
+L2TP
+====
+
+This document describes how to use the kernel's L2TP drivers to
+provide L2TP functionality. L2TP is a protocol that tunnels one or
+more sessions over an IP tunnel. It is commonly used for VPNs
+(L2TP/IPSec) and by ISPs to tunnel subscriber PPP sessions over an IP
+network infrastructure. With L2TPv3, it is also useful as a Layer-2
+tunneling infrastructure.
+
+Features
+========
+
+L2TPv2 (PPP over L2TP (UDP tunnels)).
+L2TPv3 ethernet pseudowires.
+L2TPv3 PPP pseudowires.
+L2TPv3 IP encapsulation.
+Netlink sockets for L2TPv3 configuration management.
+
+History
+=======
+
+The original pppol2tp driver was introduced in 2.6.23 and provided
+L2TPv2 functionality (rfc2661). L2TPv2 is used to tunnel one or more PPP
+sessions over a UDP tunnel.
+
+L2TPv3 (rfc3931) changes the protocol to allow different frame types
+to be passed over an L2TP tunnel by moving the PPP-specific parts of
+the protocol out of the core L2TP packet headers. Each frame type is
+known as a pseudowire type. Ethernet, PPP, HDLC, Frame Relay and ATM
+pseudowires for L2TP are defined in separate RFC standards. Another
+change for L2TPv3 is that it can be carried directly over IP with no
+UDP header (UDP is optional). It is also possible to create static
+unmanaged L2TPv3 tunnels manually without a control protocol
+(userspace daemon) to manage them.
+
+To support L2TPv3, the original pppol2tp driver was split up to
+separate the L2TP and PPP functionality. Existing L2TPv2 userspace
+apps should be unaffected as the original pppol2tp sockets API is
+retained. L2TPv3, however, uses netlink to manage L2TPv3 tunnels and
+sessions.
+
+Design
+======
+
+The L2TP protocol separates control and data frames. The L2TP kernel
+drivers handle only L2TP data frames; control frames are always
+handled by userspace. L2TP control frames carry messages between L2TP
+clients/servers and are used to setup / teardown tunnels and
+sessions. An L2TP client or server is implemented in userspace.
+
+Each L2TP tunnel is implemented using a UDP or L2TPIP socket; L2TPIP
+provides L2TPv3 IP encapsulation (no UDP) and is implemented using a
+new l2tpip socket family. The tunnel socket is typically created by
+userspace, though for unmanaged L2TPv3 tunnels, the socket can also be
+created by the kernel. Each L2TP session (pseudowire) gets a network
+interface instance. In the case of PPP, these interfaces are created
+indirectly by pppd using a pppol2tp socket. In the case of ethernet,
+the netdevice is created upon a netlink request to create an L2TPv3
+ethernet pseudowire.
+
+For PPP, the PPPoL2TP driver, net/l2tp/l2tp_ppp.c, provides a
+mechanism by which PPP frames carried through an L2TP session are
+passed through the kernel's PPP subsystem. The standard PPP daemon,
+pppd, handles all PPP interaction with the peer. PPP network
+interfaces are created for each local PPP endpoint. The kernel's PPP
+subsystem arranges for PPP control frames to be delivered to pppd,
+while data frames are forwarded as usual.
+
+For ethernet, the L2TPETH driver, net/l2tp/l2tp_eth.c, implements a
+netdevice driver, managing virtual ethernet devices, one per
+pseudowire. These interfaces can be managed using standard Linux tools
+such as "ip" and "ifconfig". If only IP frames are passed over the
+tunnel, the interface can be given an IP addresses of itself and its
+peer. If non-IP frames are to be passed over the tunnel, the interface
+can be added to a bridge using brctl. All L2TP datapath protocol
+functions are handled by the L2TP core driver.
+
+Each tunnel and session within a tunnel is assigned a unique tunnel_id
+and session_id. These ids are carried in the L2TP header of every
+control and data packet. (Actually, in L2TPv3, the tunnel_id isn't
+present in data frames - it is inferred from the IP connection on
+which the packet was received.) The L2TP driver uses the ids to lookup
+internal tunnel and/or session contexts to determine how to handle the
+packet. Zero tunnel / session ids are treated specially - zero ids are
+never assigned to tunnels or sessions in the network. In the driver,
+the tunnel context keeps a reference to the tunnel UDP or L2TPIP
+socket. The session context holds data that lets the driver interface
+to the kernel's network frame type subsystems, i.e. PPP, ethernet.
+
+Userspace Programming
+=====================
+
+For L2TPv2, there are a number of requirements on the userspace L2TP
+daemon in order to use the pppol2tp driver.
+
+1. Use a UDP socket per tunnel.
+
+2. Create a single PPPoL2TP socket per tunnel bound to a special null
+ session id. This is used only for communicating with the driver but
+ must remain open while the tunnel is active. Opening this tunnel
+ management socket causes the driver to mark the tunnel socket as an
+ L2TP UDP encapsulation socket and flags it for use by the
+ referenced tunnel id. This hooks up the UDP receive path via
+ udp_encap_rcv() in net/ipv4/udp.c. PPP data frames are never passed
+ in this special PPPoX socket.
+
+3. Create a PPPoL2TP socket per L2TP session. This is typically done
+ by starting pppd with the pppol2tp plugin and appropriate
+ arguments. A PPPoL2TP tunnel management socket (Step 2) must be
+ created before the first PPPoL2TP session socket is created.
+
+When creating PPPoL2TP sockets, the application provides information
+to the driver about the socket in a socket connect() call. Source and
+destination tunnel and session ids are provided, as well as the file
+descriptor of a UDP socket. See struct pppol2tp_addr in
+include/linux/if_pppol2tp.h. Note that zero tunnel / session ids are
+treated specially. When creating the per-tunnel PPPoL2TP management
+socket in Step 2 above, zero source and destination session ids are
+specified, which tells the driver to prepare the supplied UDP file
+descriptor for use as an L2TP tunnel socket.
+
+Userspace may control behavior of the tunnel or session using
+setsockopt and ioctl on the PPPoX socket. The following socket
+options are supported:-
+
+========= ===========================================================
+DEBUG bitmask of debug message categories. See below.
+SENDSEQ - 0 => don't send packets with sequence numbers
+ - 1 => send packets with sequence numbers
+RECVSEQ - 0 => receive packet sequence numbers are optional
+ - 1 => drop receive packets without sequence numbers
+LNSMODE - 0 => act as LAC.
+ - 1 => act as LNS.
+REORDERTO reorder timeout (in millisecs). If 0, don't try to reorder.
+========= ===========================================================
+
+Only the DEBUG option is supported by the special tunnel management
+PPPoX socket.
+
+In addition to the standard PPP ioctls, a PPPIOCGL2TPSTATS is provided
+to retrieve tunnel and session statistics from the kernel using the
+PPPoX socket of the appropriate tunnel or session.
+
+For L2TPv3, userspace must use the netlink API defined in
+include/linux/l2tp.h to manage tunnel and session contexts. The
+general procedure to create a new L2TP tunnel with one session is:-
+
+1. Open a GENL socket using L2TP_GENL_NAME for configuring the kernel
+ using netlink.
+
+2. Create a UDP or L2TPIP socket for the tunnel.
+
+3. Create a new L2TP tunnel using a L2TP_CMD_TUNNEL_CREATE
+ request. Set attributes according to desired tunnel parameters,
+ referencing the UDP or L2TPIP socket created in the previous step.
+
+4. Create a new L2TP session in the tunnel using a
+ L2TP_CMD_SESSION_CREATE request.
+
+The tunnel and all of its sessions are closed when the tunnel socket
+is closed. The netlink API may also be used to delete sessions and
+tunnels. Configuration and status info may be set or read using netlink.
+
+The L2TP driver also supports static (unmanaged) L2TPv3 tunnels. These
+are where there is no L2TP control message exchange with the peer to
+setup the tunnel; the tunnel is configured manually at each end of the
+tunnel. There is no need for an L2TP userspace application in this
+case -- the tunnel socket is created by the kernel and configured
+using parameters sent in the L2TP_CMD_TUNNEL_CREATE netlink
+request. The "ip" utility of iproute2 has commands for managing static
+L2TPv3 tunnels; do "ip l2tp help" for more information.
+
+Debugging
+=========
+
+The driver supports a flexible debug scheme where kernel trace
+messages may be optionally enabled per tunnel and per session. Care is
+needed when debugging a live system since the messages are not
+rate-limited and a busy system could be swamped. Userspace uses
+setsockopt on the PPPoX socket to set a debug mask.
+
+The following debug mask bits are available:
+
+================ ==============================
+L2TP_MSG_DEBUG verbose debug (if compiled in)
+L2TP_MSG_CONTROL userspace - kernel interface
+L2TP_MSG_SEQ sequence numbers handling
+L2TP_MSG_DATA data packets
+================ ==============================
+
+If enabled, files under a l2tp debugfs directory can be used to dump
+kernel state about L2TP tunnels and sessions. To access it, the
+debugfs filesystem must first be mounted::
+
+ # mount -t debugfs debugfs /debug
+
+Files under the l2tp directory can then be accessed::
+
+ # cat /debug/l2tp/tunnels
+
+The debugfs files should not be used by applications to obtain L2TP
+state information because the file format is subject to change. It is
+implemented to provide extra debug information to help diagnose
+problems.) Users should use the netlink API.
+
+/proc/net/pppol2tp is also provided for backwards compatibility with
+the original pppol2tp driver. It lists information about L2TPv2
+tunnels and sessions only. Its use is discouraged.
+
+Unmanaged L2TPv3 Tunnels
+========================
+
+Some commercial L2TP products support unmanaged L2TPv3 ethernet
+tunnels, where there is no L2TP control protocol; tunnels are
+configured at each side manually. New commands are available in
+iproute2's ip utility to support this.
+
+To create an L2TPv3 ethernet pseudowire between local host 192.168.1.1
+and peer 192.168.1.2, using IP addresses 10.5.1.1 and 10.5.1.2 for the
+tunnel endpoints::
+
+ # ip l2tp add tunnel tunnel_id 1 peer_tunnel_id 1 udp_sport 5000 \
+ udp_dport 5000 encap udp local 192.168.1.1 remote 192.168.1.2
+ # ip l2tp add session tunnel_id 1 session_id 1 peer_session_id 1
+ # ip -s -d show dev l2tpeth0
+ # ip addr add 10.5.1.2/32 peer 10.5.1.1/32 dev l2tpeth0
+ # ip li set dev l2tpeth0 up
+
+Choose IP addresses to be the address of a local IP interface and that
+of the remote system. The IP addresses of the l2tpeth0 interface can be
+anything suitable.
+
+Repeat the above at the peer, with ports, tunnel/session ids and IP
+addresses reversed. The tunnel and session IDs can be any non-zero
+32-bit number, but the values must be reversed at the peer.
+
+======================== ===================
+Host 1 Host2
+======================== ===================
+udp_sport=5000 udp_sport=5001
+udp_dport=5001 udp_dport=5000
+tunnel_id=42 tunnel_id=45
+peer_tunnel_id=45 peer_tunnel_id=42
+session_id=128 session_id=5196755
+peer_session_id=5196755 peer_session_id=128
+======================== ===================
+
+When done at both ends of the tunnel, it should be possible to send
+data over the network. e.g.::
+
+ # ping 10.5.1.1
+
+
+Sample Userspace Code
+=====================
+
+1. Create tunnel management PPPoX socket::
+
+ kernel_fd = socket(AF_PPPOX, SOCK_DGRAM, PX_PROTO_OL2TP);
+ if (kernel_fd >= 0) {
+ struct sockaddr_pppol2tp sax;
+ struct sockaddr_in const *peer_addr;
+
+ peer_addr = l2tp_tunnel_get_peer_addr(tunnel);
+ memset(&sax, 0, sizeof(sax));
+ sax.sa_family = AF_PPPOX;
+ sax.sa_protocol = PX_PROTO_OL2TP;
+ sax.pppol2tp.fd = udp_fd; /* fd of tunnel UDP socket */
+ sax.pppol2tp.addr.sin_addr.s_addr = peer_addr->sin_addr.s_addr;
+ sax.pppol2tp.addr.sin_port = peer_addr->sin_port;
+ sax.pppol2tp.addr.sin_family = AF_INET;
+ sax.pppol2tp.s_tunnel = tunnel_id;
+ sax.pppol2tp.s_session = 0; /* special case: mgmt socket */
+ sax.pppol2tp.d_tunnel = 0;
+ sax.pppol2tp.d_session = 0; /* special case: mgmt socket */
+
+ if(connect(kernel_fd, (struct sockaddr *)&sax, sizeof(sax) ) < 0 ) {
+ perror("connect failed");
+ result = -errno;
+ goto err;
+ }
+ }
+
+2. Create session PPPoX data socket::
+
+ struct sockaddr_pppol2tp sax;
+ int fd;
+
+ /* Note, the target socket must be bound already, else it will not be ready */
+ sax.sa_family = AF_PPPOX;
+ sax.sa_protocol = PX_PROTO_OL2TP;
+ sax.pppol2tp.fd = tunnel_fd;
+ sax.pppol2tp.addr.sin_addr.s_addr = addr->sin_addr.s_addr;
+ sax.pppol2tp.addr.sin_port = addr->sin_port;
+ sax.pppol2tp.addr.sin_family = AF_INET;
+ sax.pppol2tp.s_tunnel = tunnel_id;
+ sax.pppol2tp.s_session = session_id;
+ sax.pppol2tp.d_tunnel = peer_tunnel_id;
+ sax.pppol2tp.d_session = peer_session_id;
+
+ /* session_fd is the fd of the session's PPPoL2TP socket.
+ * tunnel_fd is the fd of the tunnel UDP socket.
+ */
+ fd = connect(session_fd, (struct sockaddr *)&sax, sizeof(sax));
+ if (fd < 0 ) {
+ return -errno;
+ }
+ return 0;
+
+Internal Implementation
+=======================
+
+The driver keeps a struct l2tp_tunnel context per L2TP tunnel and a
+struct l2tp_session context for each session. The l2tp_tunnel is
+always associated with a UDP or L2TP/IP socket and keeps a list of
+sessions in the tunnel. The l2tp_session context keeps kernel state
+about the session. It has private data which is used for data specific
+to the session type. With L2TPv2, the session always carried PPP
+traffic. With L2TPv3, the session can also carry ethernet frames
+(ethernet pseudowire) or other data types such as ATM, HDLC or Frame
+Relay.
+
+When a tunnel is first opened, the reference count on the socket is
+increased using sock_hold(). This ensures that the kernel socket
+cannot be removed while L2TP's data structures reference it.
+
+Some L2TP sessions also have a socket (PPP pseudowires) while others
+do not (ethernet pseudowires). We can't use the socket reference count
+as the reference count for session contexts. The L2TP implementation
+therefore has its own internal reference counts on the session
+contexts.
+
+To Do
+=====
+
+Add L2TP tunnel switching support. This would route tunneled traffic
+from one L2TP tunnel into another. Specified in
+http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-l2tpext-tunnel-switching-08
+
+Add L2TPv3 VLAN pseudowire support.
+
+Add L2TPv3 IP pseudowire support.
+
+Add L2TPv3 ATM pseudowire support.
+
+Miscellaneous
+=============
+
+The L2TP drivers were developed as part of the OpenL2TP project by
+Katalix Systems Ltd. OpenL2TP is a full-featured L2TP client / server,
+designed from the ground up to have the L2TP datapath in the
+kernel. The project also implemented the pppol2tp plugin for pppd
+which allows pppd to use the kernel driver. Details can be found at
+http://www.openl2tp.org.