# MPLS Label Distribution Protocols Overview

Label distribution protocols create and maintain the label-to-FEC bindings along an LSP from MPLS domain ingress to MPLS domain egress. A label distribution protocol is a set of procedures by which one LSR informs a peer LSR of the meaning of the labels used to forward traffic between them. It enables each peer to learn about the other peer’s label mappings. The label distribution protocol provides the information MPLS uses to create the forwarding tables in each LSR in the MPLS domain.

| Note: Label distribution protocols are sometimes referred to as signaling protocols. However, label distribution is a more accurate description of their function and is preferred in this text.

The following protocols are currently used for label distribution:

- BGP—Border Gateway Protocol
- LDP—Label Distribution Protocol
- RSVP-TE—Resource Reservation Protocol with traffic-engineering extensions that enable label binding and explicit route capability

  | Note: To reduce confusion, this text uses the lowercase term, label distribution protocol, to refer to the generic class of protocols. The acronym, LDP, refers only to the particular protocol named Label Distribution Protocol.

BGP and LDP have no traffic-engineering capability and support only best-effort LSPs. LDP supports topology-driven MPLS networks in best-effort, hop-by-hop implementations. RSVP-TE is used primarily for MPLS applications that require traffic engineering (TE) or quality of service (QoS) capabilities, but they also support best-effort LSPs.

## LDP Messages and Sessions

LDP creates reliable sessions by running over TCP. You do not have to explicitly configure LDP peers, because each LSR actively discovers all other LSRs to which it is directly connected. LDP is a hard-state protocol, meaning that after the LSP is established, it is assumed to remain in place until it has been explicitly torn down. This is in contrast to RSVP-TE, which is a soft-state protocol. See RSVP-TE Messages and Sessions.

LDP uses many messages to create LSPs, classified in the following four types:

- Discovery—To identify other LSRs
- Adjacency—To create, maintain, and end sessions between LSRs
- Label advertisement—To request, map, withdraw, and release labels
- Notification—To provide advisory and error information

Unlike the other LDP messages, the discovery process runs over UDP. Each LSR periodically broadcasts a link hello message to the well-known UDP port, 646. Each LSR listens on this port for link hello messages from other LSRs. In this manner, each LSR learns about all other LSRs to which it is directly connected, creating link hello adjacencies. When an LSR learns about another LSR, it establishes a TCP connection to the peer on well-known TCP port 646 and creates an LDP session on top of the TCP connection.

A transport address for the local peer is advertised in LDP discovery hello messages. Interfaces that use the platform label space default to the LSR router ID for the transport address. You can use the mpls ldp discovery transport-address command to specify an arbitrary IP address as the transport address.

LDP can also discover peers that are not directly connected if you provide the LSR with the IP address of one or more peers by means of an access list. The LSR sends targeted hello messages to UDP port 646 on each remote peer. If the targeted peer responds with a targeted hello message to the initiator, a targeted hello adjacency is created and session establishment can proceed.

In certain cases, a targeted hello adjacency to directly connected peers might be useful. If an LSR receives both a link hello message and a targeted hello message from the same initiator, only a single LDP session is established between the LSRs.

By default, because all LSRs listen on the well-known port, they all attempt to create a session with the originator. You can use the mpls ldp link-hello disable command to suppress the transmission of link hello messages. Thereafter, sessions are formed only with peers contacted with targeted hello messages.

The LDP peers exchange session initialization messages that include timer values and graceful-restart parameters. An LSR responds with a keepalive message if the values in the initialization message are acceptable. If any value is not acceptable, the LSR responds instead with an error notification message, terminating the session. After a session is established, LDP peers exchange keepalive messages that verify continued functioning of the LSR. Failure to receive an expected keepalive message causes an LSR to terminate the LDP session.

Label mapping and distribution use downstream-unsolicited, independent control.

With downstream-unsolicited, independent control, an LSR creates a label binding whenever it learns a new IGP route; the LSR sends a label mapping message immediately to all of its peer LSRs—upstream and downstream—without having received a label request message from any peer. The LSR sends the label mapping message regardless of whether it has received a label mapping message from a downstream LSR. This is the label distribution method employed in a topology-driven MPLS network.

A downstream LSR can send a label withdrawal message to recall a label that it previously mapped. If an LSR that has received a label mapping subsequently determines that it no longer needs that label, it can send a label release message that frees the label for use.

## RSVP-TE Messages and Sessions

RSVP is described in RFC 2205. Multiple RFCs enable extensions to RSVP for traffic engineering. The router supports the extended version of RSVP, referred to as RSVP-TE.

RSVP-TE is “ unreliable” because it does not use TCP to exchange messages. In contrast to LDP—a hard-state protocol—RSVP-TE is a soft-state protocol, meaning that much of the session information is embedded in a state machine on each LSR. The state machine must be refreshed periodically to avoid session termination. LSRs send path messages to downstream peers to create and refresh local path states. LSRs send resv messages to upstream peers in response to path messages to create and refresh local resv states. A session is ended if the state machine is not refreshed within the RSVP tunnel timeout period, which is determined as follows:

For example, for the default values,

RSVP-TE messages carry objects consisting of type-length-values (TLVs). The label request object instructs the endpoint LSR to return an resv message to establish the LSP. The resv message contains the label object, the label used for the FEC. Both the path and resv messages carry the record route object, which records the route traversed by the message.

An upstream LSR sends a pathtear message when its path state times out as a result of not being refreshed. The pathtear message removes the path and resv states in each LSR as it proceeds downstream. Downstream LSRs similarly send the resvtear message when their resv state times out to remove the resv states in upstream LSRs.

If a downstream LSR determines that it received an erroneous path message, it sends a patherr message to the sender. If a reservation (label) request fails, the request initiator sends a resverr message to the downstream LSRs. Both of these messages are advisory and do not alter path or resv state.

## RSVP-TE State Refresh and Reliability

RSVP-TE employs refresh messages to synchronize state between neighbors and to recover from lost RSVP-TE messages of other types. RSVP-TE by default does not provide for reliable transmission. Each node is responsible for the transmission of RSVP-TE messages to its neighbors and relies on periodic state refreshes to recover from lost messages.

RSVP-TE refresh reduction provides a means to increase reliability while reducing message handling and synchronization overhead. Issuing the mpls rsvp refresh-reduction command enables the following features:

- The message ID object is included in RSVP-TE messages to provide a unique message ID on a per-hop basis. In refresh messages, it indicates to the receiving node that the message is a refresh message, eliminating the need for the node to completely analyze the message and thus reducing the processing overhead at the receiver.
- RSVP-TE uses a message acknowledgment mechanism to support reliable message delivery on a per-hop basis. Messages that include the message ID object also include a request for acknowledgment. Upon receipt, the receiving node returns a message ack object, enabling the sending node to determine whether a message was lost and triggering a retransmission as necessary.
- Summary refresh (srefresh) messages refresh the state previously advertised in path or resv messages that included message ID objects. The srefresh message carries the unique message ID as state identifier, eliminating the need to send whole refresh messages and reducing the overhead needed to maintain RSVP-TE state synchronization. This method maintains RSVP-TE's ability to indicate when the state is lost and to adjust to changes in routing. The srefresh message can carry message IDs for multiple RSVP-TE sessions.

Issuing the mpls rsvp message-bundling command enables RSVP-TE to use bundle messages, each of which includes multiple standard RSVP-TE messages, to reduce the overall message processing overhead.

## BGP Signaling

You can use BGP as a label distribution protocol both for IP routes and for VPN routes.

When BGP distributes a particular IP route, it can also distribute an MPLS label that has been mapped to that route, as described in RFC 3107. The MP-BGP extensions (RFC 4760) enable the BGP update message to carry both the route and the label mapping information for the route. The label is encoded into the NLRI field of the attribute, and the SAFI field is set to 4 to indicate that the NLRI contains a label. A BGP speaker can use BGP to send labels to a particular BGP peer only if that peer advertised the capability to process update messages with SAFI 4. BGP speakers advertise this capability only to peers for which the neighbor send-label command has been configured.

When BGP advertises labeled routes, it adds a label-to-next-hop mapping (cross-connect) to the MPLS forwarding table. This mapping consists of the in label that BGP allocates from the platform label space plus the MPLS next hop information related to the labeled route's next hop.

BGP can also distribute labels for VPN routes in BGP/MPLS VPNs. In a BGP/MPLS VPN network, BGP is used to exchange the routes of a particular VPN among the provider edge routers attached to the VPN. To ensure that routes from different VPNS remain distinct even if the VPNs use overlapping address spaces, an MPLS label is assigned to each route within the VPN. BGP distributes both the VPN routes and the associated MPLS label for each route.

The label mapping information for a particular VPN route is included in the same BGP update message that distributes the route. The label is encoded into the NLRI field of the attribute, and the SAFI field has a value of 128 to indicate that the NLRI contains both an RD (route distinguisher) and a label.

For more information on BGP capabilities, see Configuring BGP Routing. For more information on MP-BGP extensions, NLRIs, and BGP/MPLS VPNs, see Configuring BGP-MPLS Applications.

#### Related Documentation

- MPLS Label Distribution Methodology
- MPLS Label Switching and Packet Forwarding Overview
- MPLS Interfaces and Interface Stacking Overview
- Topology-Driven LSPs Overview