RFC 3542 · INFORMATIONAL · 2003 SUN · 14 JUN 2026

Advanced Sockets Application Program Interface for IPv6

By W. Stevens, M. Thomas, E. Nordmark, T. Jinmei · Published June 2003 · DOI 10.17487/RFC3542

Overview

RFC 3542, “Advanced Sockets Application Program Interface for IPv6”, is an Informational document published in June 2003 by W. Stevens, M. Thomas, E. Nordmark, T. Jinmei. It obsoletes RFC 2292. The canonical text is published by the RFC Editor.

Abstract

This document provides sockets Application Program Interface (API) to support "advanced" IPv6 applications, as a supplement to a separate specification, RFC 3493. The expected applications include Ping, Traceroute, routing daemons and the like, which typically use raw sockets to access IPv6 or ICMPv6 header fields. This document proposes some portable interfaces for applications that use raw sockets under IPv6. There are other features of IPv6 that some applications will need to access: interface identification (specifying the outgoing interface and determining the incoming interface), IPv6 extension headers, and path Maximum Transmission Unit (MTU) information. This document provides API access to these features too. Additionally, some extended interfaces to libraries for the "r" commands are defined. The extension will provide better backward compatibility to existing implementations that are not IPv6-capable. This memo provides information for the Internet community.

Abstract as published in the RFC, via rfc-editor.org.

What “Informational” means

Published for the general information of the community. It does not define an IETF standard and carries no standards-track status.

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Relationships to other RFCs

This RFC obsoletes: RFC 2292

Other RFCs from 2003

Abstract

What “Informational” means

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