Open Cloud Mesh
draft-lopresti-open-cloud-mesh-05
This document is an Internet-Draft (I-D).
Anyone may submit an I-D to the IETF.
This I-D is not endorsed by the IETF and has no formal standing in the
IETF standards process.
| Document | Type | Active Internet-Draft (individual) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Authors | Giuseppe Lo Presti , Michiel B. de Jong , Mahdi Baghbani , Micke Nordin | ||
| Last updated | 2025-08-20 | ||
| RFC stream | (None) | ||
| Intended RFC status | (None) | ||
| Formats | |||
| Stream | Stream state | (No stream defined) | |
| Consensus boilerplate | Unknown | ||
| RFC Editor Note | (None) | ||
| IESG | IESG state | I-D Exists | |
| Telechat date | (None) | ||
| Responsible AD | (None) | ||
| Send notices to | (None) |
draft-lopresti-open-cloud-mesh-05
Network Working Group G. Lo Presti
Internet-Draft CERN
Intended status: Standards Track M. B. de Jong
Expires: 21 February 2026 M. Baghbani
Ponder Source
M. Nordin
SUNET
20 August 2025
Open Cloud Mesh
draft-lopresti-open-cloud-mesh-05
Abstract
Open Cloud Mesh (OCM) is a server federation protocol that is used to
notify a Receiving Party that they have been granted access to some
Resource. It has similarities with authorization flows such as
OAuth, as well as with social internet protocols such as ActivityPub
and email.
A core use case of OCM is when a user (e.g., Alice on System A)
wishes to share a resource (e.g., a file) with another user (e.g.,
Bob on System B) without transferring the resource itself or
requiring Bob to log in to System A.
While this scenario is illustrative, OCM is designed to support a
broader range of interactions, including but not limited to file
transfers.
Open Cloud Mesh handles interactions only up to the point where the
Receiving Party is informed of their access to the Resource. Actual
Resource access is subsequently managed by other protocols, such as
WebDAV.
Status of This Memo
This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the
provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.
Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering
Task Force (IETF). Note that other groups may also distribute
working documents as Internet-Drafts. The list of current Internet-
Drafts is at https://datatracker.ietf.org/drafts/current/.
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 1]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months
and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any
time. It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference
material or to cite them other than as "work in progress."
This Internet-Draft will expire on 21 February 2026.
Copyright Notice
Copyright (c) 2025 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
document authors. All rights reserved.
This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
Provisions Relating to IETF Documents (https://trustee.ietf.org/
license-info) in effect on the date of publication of this document.
Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights
and restrictions with respect to this document. Code Components
extracted from this document must include Revised BSD License text as
described in Section 4.e of the Trust Legal Provisions and are
provided without warranty as described in the Revised BSD License.
Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
2. Terms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3. General Flow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
4. Establishing Contact . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
4.1. Direct Entry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
4.2. Address books . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
4.3. Public Link Flow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
4.4. Public Invite Flow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
4.5. Invite Flow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
4.5.1. Rationale . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
4.5.2. Steps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
4.5.3. Invite Acceptance Request Details . . . . . . . . . . 9
4.5.4. Invite Acceptance Response Details . . . . . . . . . 10
4.5.5. Addition into address books . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
4.5.6. Security Advantages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
5. OCM API Discovery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
5.1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
5.2. Process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
5.3. Fields . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
6. Share Creation Notification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
6.1. Fields . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
6.2. Decision to Discard . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
7. Receiving Party Notification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
8. Share Acceptance Notification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
8.1. Fields . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 2]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
8.1.1. Receiving Party Notification . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
9. Resource Access . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
10. Share Deletion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
11. Share Updating . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
12. Resharing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
13. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
14. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
14.1. Trust . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
14.1.1. httpsig . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
14.2. Legacy shared secrets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
15. References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
15.1. Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
15.2. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
16. Appendix A: Multi-factor Authentication . . . . . . . . . . . 25
17. Appendix B: Request Signing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
17.1. How to generate the Signature for outgoing request . . . 26
17.2. How to confirm Signature on incoming request . . . . . . 27
17.3. Validating the payload . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
18. Appendix C: Directory Service . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
19. Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Authors' Addresses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
1. Introduction
Open Cloud Mesh was initially conceived of in 2015 and has been
deployed since 2016. OCM has been implemented by several platforms,
including CERNBox, Nextcloud, OpenCloud, ownCloud, and Seafile.
The goal of OCM is to provide a secure, scalable, and flexible
infrastructure for securely sharing and collaborating on resources
and has seen wide adoption, not least in the academic sector.
The core idea of OCM is to make it simple for users to do the right
thing. This is achieved by providing a protocol that abstracts away
security and authentication details from the users to the servers
acting on behalf of the users. Another important point of the
protocol is the invitation mechanism that lets users connect over
established human relationships and uses those connections to
establish contact between their respective OCM servers.
2. Terms
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
"SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "NOT RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and
"OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in BCP
14 [RFC2119] [RFC8174] when, and only when, they appear in all
capitals, as shown here.
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 3]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
We define the following concepts, with some non-normative references
to related concepts from OAuth [RFC6749] and elsewhere:
* *Resource* - The piece of data or interaction to which access is
being granted, including but not limited to: a file or folder, a
video call, a contact, a printer queue, etc.
* *Remote Resource* - A Resource provided by the Sending Server.
* *Shared Resource* - A Resource shared by an OCM Server, becoming a
Remote Resource if accepted by the Invite Receiver OCM Server.
* *Share* - A policy rule stating that certain actors have specific
access rights to a Resource; it MAY also refer to a record in a
database representing this rule.
* *Sending Party* - A person or party who is authorized to create
Shares; similar to "Resource Owner" in OAuth [RFC6749], identified
by its OCM Address.
* *Receiving Party* - A person, group or party who is granted access
to the Resource through the Share; similar to "Requesting Party /
RqP" in OAuth-UMA, identified by its OCM Address.
* *Share Creation Notification* - A server-to-server request from
the sending server to the receiving server, notifying the
receiving server that a Share has been created.
* *Sending Server* - The server that:
- holds the Resource ("file server" or "Entreprise File Sync and
Share (EFSS) server" role),
- provides access to it (by exposing at least one "API"),
- takes the decision to create the Share based on user interface
gestures from the Sending Party (the "Authorization Server"
role in OAuth [RFC6749]),
- takes the decision about authorizing attempts to access the
Resource (the "Resource Server" role in OAuth [RFC6749]),
- sends out Share Creation Notifications when appropriate (see
below).
* *Receiving Server* - The server that:
- receives Share Creation Notifications (see below),
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 4]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
- actively or passively notifies the receiving user or group of
any incoming Share Creation Notification,
- acts as an API client, allowing the receiving user to access
the Resource through an API (e.g., WebDAV [RFC4918]) of the
sending server.
* *Sending Gesture* - A user interface interaction from the Sending
Party to the Sending Server, conveying the intention to create a
Share.
* *Share Creation* - The addition of a Share to the database state
of the Sending Server, in response to a successful Sending Gesture
or for another reason.
* *Sharing User* - A user providing access to a Resource through a
Share.
* *FQDN* - Fully Qualified Domain Name, such as "cloud.example.com".
* *OCM Server* - A server that supports OCM.
* *OCM API Discovery* - Process of evaluating properties of a Remote
Resource, after establishing contact with an OCM Server.
* *Discovering Server* - A server that tries to obtain information
in OCM API Discovery.
* *Discoverable Server* - A server that tries to supply information
in OCM API Discovery.
* *OCM Address* - A string of the form <Receiving Party's
identifier>@<fqdn> which can be used to uniquely identify a user
or group "at" an OCM Server and MAY be referred to as Federated
Cloud ID. <Receiving Party's identifier> is an opaque string,
unique at the server. <fqdn> is the Fully Qualified Domain Name
by which the server is identified. This MUST be the domain at
which the /.well-known/ocm endpoint of that server is hosted.
* *OCM Notification* - A message from the Receiving Server to the
Sending Server or vice versa, using the OCM Notifications
endpoint.
* *Invite Message* - Out-of-band message used to establish contact
between parties and servers in the Invite Flow, containing an
Invite Token (see below) and the Invite Sender's OCM Address.
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 5]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
* *Invite Sender* - The party sending an Invite, identified by its
OCM Address.
* *Invite Receiver* - The party receiving an Invite, identified by
its OCM Address.
* *Invite Sender OCM Server* - The server holding an address book
used by the Invite Sender, to which details of the Invite Receiver
are to be added.
* *Invite Receiver OCM Server* - The server holding an address book
used by the Invite Receiver, to which details of the Invite Sender
are to be added.
* *Invite Token* - A hard-to-guess string used in the Invite Flow,
generated by the Invite Sender OCM Server and linked uniquely to
the Invite Sender's OCM Address.
* *Invite Creation Gesture* - Gesture from the Invite Sender to the
Invite Sender OCM Server, resulting in the creation of an Invite
Token.
* *Invite Acceptance Gesture* - Gesture from the Invite Receiver to
the Invite Receiver OCM Server, supplying the Invite Token as well
as the OCM Address of the Invite Sender, effectively allowlisting
the Invite Sender OCM Server for sending Share Creation
Notifications to the Invite Receiver OCM Server.
* *Invite Acceptance Request* - API call from the Invite Receiver
OCM Server to the Invite Sender OCM Server, supplying the Invite
Token as well as the OCM Address of the Invite Receiver,
effectively allowlisting the Invite Sender OCM Server for sending
Share Creation Notifications to the Invite Receiver OCM Server.
* *Invite Acceptance Response* - HTTP response to the Invite
Acceptance Request.
* *Share Name* - A human-readable string, provided by the Sending
Party or the Sending Server, to help the Receiving Party
understand which Resource the Share grants access to.
* *Share Permissions* - protocol-specific allowances granted to the
Receiving Party on the modes of accessing the Resource.
* *Share Requirements* - Protocol-specific restrictions on the modes
of accessing the Resource.
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 6]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
* *WAYF Page* - A Where-Are-You-From page is a discovery service
used to identify the OCM Server of an Invite Receiver.
* *Directory Service* - A third-party service that exposes a list of
trusted OCM Servers.
3. General Flow
The lifecycle of an Open Cloud Mesh Share starts with prerequisites
such as establishing trust, establishing contact, and OCM API
Discovery.
Then the share creation involves the Sending Party making a Sending
Gesture to the Sending Server, the Sending Server carrying out the
actual Share Creation, and the Sending Server sending a Share
Creation Notification to the Receiving Server.
After this, the Receiving Server MAY notify the Receiving Party and/
or the Sending Server, and will act as an API client through which
the Receiving Party can access the Resource. After that, the Share
MAY be updated, deleted, and/or reshared.
4. Establishing Contact
Before the Sending Server can send a Share Creation Notification to
the Receiving Server, it MUST establish the Receiving Party's OCM
Address (containing the Receiving Server's FQDN, and the Receiving
Party's identifier), among other things. Some steps may preceed the
Sending Gesture, allowing the Sending Party to establish (with some
level of trust) the OCM Address of the Receiving Party. In other
cases, establishing the OCM Address of the Receiving Party happens as
part of the Sending Gesture.
4.1. Direct Entry
The simplest way for this is if the Receiving Party shares their OCM
Address with the Sending Party through some out-of-band means, and
the Sending Party enters this string into the user interface of the
Sending Server, by means of typing or pasting into an HTML form, or
clicking a link to a URL that includes the string in some form.
4.2. Address books
The Sending Server MAY offer the Sending Party an address book tool,
where OCM Addresses can be stored over time in a labeled and/or
searchable way. This decouples the act by which the OCM Address
string is passed into the Sending Server's database from the
selection of the Receiving Party in preparation for Share Creation.
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 7]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
4.3. Public Link Flow
An interface for anonymously viewing a Resource on the Sending Server
MAY allow any internet user to type or paste an OCM address into an
HTML form, as a Sending Gesture. This means that the Sending Party
and the Receiving Party could be the same person, so contact between
them does not need to be explicitly established.
4.4. Public Invite Flow
Similarly, an interface on the Sending Server MAY allow any internet
user to type or paste an OCM address into an HTML form, as a Sending
Gesture for a given Resource, without itself providing a way to
access that particular Resource. A link to this interface could then
for instance be shared on a mailing list, allowing all subscribers to
effectively request access to the Resource by making a Sending
Gesture to the Sending Server with their own OCM Address.
4.5. Invite Flow
4.5.1. Rationale
Many methods for establishing contact allow unsolicited contact with
the prospective Receiving Party whenever that party's OCM Address is
known. The Invite Flow requires the Receiving Party to explicitly
accept it before it can be used, which establishes bidirectional
trust between the two parties involved.
OCM Servers MAY enforce a policy to only accept Shares between such
trusted contacts, or MAY display a warning to the Receiving Party
when a Share Creation Notification from an unknown Sending Party is
received
4.5.2. Steps
* the Invite Sender OCM Server generates a unique Invite Token and
helps the Invite Sender to create the Invite Message
* the Invite Sender uses some out-of-band communication to send the
Invite Message, containing the Invite Token and the Invite Sender
OCM Server FQDN, to the Invite Receiver
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 8]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
* the Invite Receiver navigates to the Invite Receiver OCM Server
and makes the Invite Acceptance Gesture. This step MAY be
facilitated if the Invite Sender OCM Server implements a WAYF
Page, such that the Invite Message would include a link to it for
the Invite Receiver to navigate to: the Invite Receiver would then
be able to indicate their OCM Server and proceed with the Invite
Acceptance Gsture without manually copying the Invite Token.
* the Invite Receiver OCM Server discovers the OCM API of the Invite
Sender OCM Server using generic OCM API Discovery (see section
below)
* the Invite Receiver OCM Server sends the Invite Acceptance Request
to the Invite Sender OCM Server
4.5.3. Invite Acceptance Request Details
Whereas the precise syntax of the Invite Message and the Invite
Acceptance Gesture will differ between implementations, the Invite
Acceptance Request SHOULD be a HTTP POST request:
* to the /invite-accepted path in the Invite Sender OCM Server's OCM
API
* using application/json as the Content-Type HTTP request header
* its request body containing a JSON document representing an object
with the following string fields:
- REQUIRED: recipientProvider - FQDN of the Invite Receiver OCM
Server.
- REQUIRED: token - The Invite Token. The Invite Sender OCM
Server SHOULD recall which Invite Sender OCM Address this token
was linked to.
- REQUIRED: userID - The Invite Receiver's identifier at their
OCM Server.
- REQUIRED: email - Non-normative / informational; an email
address for the Invite Receiver. Not necessarily at the same
FQDN as their OCM Server.
- REQUIRED: name - Human-readable name of the Invite Receiver, as
a suggestion for display in the Invite Sender's address book
* using TLS
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 9]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
* using httpsig [RFC9421]
The Invite Receiver OCM Server SHOULD apply its own policies for
trusting the Invite Sender OCM Server before making the Invite
Acceptance Request.
Since the Invite Flow does not require either Party to type or
remember the userID, this string does not need to be human-memorable.
Even if the Invite Receiver has a memorable username at the Invite
Receiver OCM Server, this userID that forms part of their OCM Address
does not need to match it.
Also, a different userID could be given out to each contact, to avoid
correlation of identities.
If the Invite Sender OCM Server implements a WAYF Page, such a page
MAY include a fixed list of servers, in addition to, or instead of, a
free-text input where any OCM Server can be entered. This is
especially useful if the Invite Sender is part of a federation of
associated OCM Servers. In order to populate the list of associated
OCM Servers, the Invite Sender's server MAY make use of a Directory
Service, which is expected to follow the specification detailed in
Appendix C.
Implementors that provide a WAYF Page SHOULD make the URL for the API
endpoint of such a Directory Service configurable, allowing the OCM
Server to be part of a network of associated OCM Servers. The
configuration mechanism MAY allow an OCM Server to be part of
multiple networks, thus displaying a union of multiple lists in its
WAYF Page.
4.5.4. Invite Acceptance Response Details
The Invite Acceptance Response SHOULD be a HTTP response:
* in response to the Invite Acceptance Request
* using application/json as the Content-Type HTTP response header
* its response body containing a JSON document representing an
object with the following string fields:
- REQUIRED: userID - the Invite Sender's identifier at their OCM
Server
- REQUIRED: email - non-normative / informational; an email
address for the Invite Sender. Not necessarily at the same
FQDN as their OCM Server
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 10]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
- REQUIRED: name - human-readable name of the Invite Sender, as a
suggestion for display in the Invite Receiver's address book
A 200 response status means the Invite Acceptance Request was
successful. A 400 response status means the Invite Token is invalid
or does not exist. A 403 response status means the Invite Receiver
OCM Server is not trusted to accept this Invite. A 409 response
status means the Invite was already accepted.
The Invite Sender OCM Server SHOULD verify the HTTP Signature on the
Invite Acceptance Request and apply its own policies for trusting the
Invite Receiver OCM Server before processing the Invite Acceptance
Request and sending the Invite Acceptance Response.
As with the userID in the Invite Acceptance Request, the one in the
Response also doesn't need to be human-memorable, doesn't need to
match the Invite Sender's username at their OCM Server.
4.5.5. Addition into address books
Following these step, both servers MAY display the name of the other
party as a trusted or allowlisted contact, and enable selecting them
as a Receiving Party. OCM Servers MAY enforce a policy to only
accept Share Creation Notifications from such trusted contacts, or
MAY display a warning to users when a Share Creation Notification
from an unknown party is received.
Both servers MAY also allowlist each other as a server with which at
least one of their users wishes to interact.
Note that Invites act symmetrically, so once contact has been
established, both the Invite Sender and the Invite Receiver MAY take
on either the Sending Party or the Receiving Party role in subsequent
Share Creation events.
Both parties MAY delete the other party from their address book at
any time without notifying them.
4.5.6. Security Advantages
It is important to underscore the value of the Invite in this
scenario, as it provides four important security advantages. First
of all, if the Receiving Server blocks Share Creation Notifications
from Sending Parties who are not in the address book of the Receiving
Party, then this protects the Receiving Party from receiving
unsolicited Shares. An attacker could still send the Receiving Party
an unsolicited Share, but they would first need to convince the
Receiving Party through an out-of-band communication channel to
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 11]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
accept their invite. In many use cases, the Receiving Party has had
other forms of contact with the Sending Party (e.g., in-person or
email back-and-forth). The out-of-band Invite Message thus leverages
the filters and context which the Receiving Party may already benefit
from in that out-of-band communication. For instance, a careful
Receiving Party MAY choose to only accept Invites that reach them via
a private or moderated messaging platform.
Second, when the Receiving Party accepts the Invite, the Receiving
Server knows that the Sending Server they are about to interact with
is trusted by the Sending Party, which in turn is trusted by the
Receiving Party, which in turn is trusted by them. In other words,
one of their users is requesting the allowlisting of a server they
wish to interact with, in order to interact with a party they know
out-of-band. This gives the Receiving Server reason to put more
trust in the Sending Server than it would put into an arbitrary
internet-hosted server.
Third, equivalently, the Sending Server knows it is essentially
registering the Receiving Server as an API client at the request of
the Receiving Party, to whom the right to request this has been
traceably delegated by the Sending Party, which is one of its
registered users.
Fourth, related to the second one, it removes the partial 'open
relay' problem that exists when the Sending Server is allowed to
include any Receiving Server FQDN in the Sending Gesture. Without
the use of Invites, a Distributed Denial of Service attack could be
organised if many internet users collude to flood a given OCM Server
with Share Creation Notifications which will be hard to distinguish
from legitimate requests without human interaction. An unsolicited
(invalid) Invite Acceptance Request is much easier to filter out than
an unsolicited (possibly valid, possibly invalid) Share Creation
Notification Request, since the Invite Acceptance Request needs to
contain an Invite Token that was previously uniquely generated at the
Invite Sender OCM server.
5. OCM API Discovery
5.1. Introduction
After establishing contact as discussed in the previous section, the
Sharing User MAY send the Share Creation Gesture to the Sending
Server. The Sharing User MUST provide the following information:
* Resource to be shared
* Protocol to be offered for access
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 12]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
* Sending Party's identifier
* Receiving Party's identifier
* Receiving Server FQDN
* OPTIONAL: Share Requirements
* OPTIONAL: Share Name
* OPTIONAL: Share Permissions
The next step is for the Sending Server to additionally discover:
* if the Receiving Server is trusted
* if the Receiving Server supports OCM
* if so, which version and with which optional functionality
* at which URL
* the public key the Receiving Server will use for HTTP Signatures
(if any)
The Sending Server MAY first perform denylist and allowlist checks on
the FQDN.
If a finite allowlist of Receiving Servers exists on the Sending
Server side, then this list MAY already contain all necessary
information.
If the FQDN passes the denylist and/or allowlist checks, but no
details about its OCM API are known, the Sending Server can use the
following process to try to fetch this information from the Receiving
Server.
This process MAY be influenced by a VPN connection and/or IP
allowlisting.
When OCM API Discovery can occur in preparation of a Share Creation
Notification, the Sending Server takes on the 'Discovering Server'
role and the Receiving Server plays the role of 'Discoverable
Server'.
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 13]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
5.2. Process
At the start of the process, the Discovering Server has either an OCM
Address, or just an FQDN from for instance the recipientProvider
field of an Invite Acceptance Request.
Step 1: In case it has an OCM Address, it SHOULD first extract <fqdn>
from it (the part after the last @ sign). Step 2: The Discovering
Server SHOULD attempt OCM API Discovery via a HTTP GET request to
https://<fqdn>/.well-known/ocm. Step 3: If that results in a valid
HTTP response with a valid JSON response body within reasonable time,
go to step 7. Step 4: If not, try a HTTP GET with
https://<fqdn>/ocm-provider as the URL instead. Step 5: If that
results in a valid HTTP response with a valid JSON response body
within reasonable time, go to step 7. Step 6: If not, fail. Step 7:
The JSON response body is the data that was discovered.
5.3. Fields
The JSON response body offered by the Discoverable Server SHOULD
contain the following information about its OCM API:
* REQUIRED: enabled (boolean) - Whether the OCM service is enabled
at this endpoint
* REQUIRED: apiVersion (string) - The OCM API version this endpoint
supports. Example: "1.2.1"
* REQUIRED: endPoint (string) - The URI of the OCM API available at
this endpoint. Example: "https://my-cloud-storage.org/ocm"
* OPTIONAL: provider (string) - A friendly branding name of this
endpoint. Example: "MyCloudStorage"
* REQUIRED: resourceTypes (array) - A list of all resource types
this server supports in both the Sending Server role and the
Receiving Server role, with their access protocols. Each item in
this list SHOULD itself be an object containing the following
fields:
- name (string) - A supported resource type (file, calendar,
contact, ...). Implementations MUST offer support for at least
one resource type, where file is the commonly supported one.
Each resource type is identified by its name: the list MUST NOT
contain more than one resource type object per given name.
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 14]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
- shareTypes (array of string) - The supported recipient share
types. MUST contain "user" at a minimum, plus optionally
"group" and "federation". Example: ["user"]
- protocols (object) - The supported protocols for accessing
Shared Resources of this type. Implementations that offer file
Resources MUST support at least webdav, any other combination
of Resources and protocols is optional. Example: json {
"webdav": "/remote/dav/ocm/", "webapp": "/app/ocm/", "talk":
"/apps/spreed/api/" } Fields:
o webdav (string) - The top-level WebDAV [RFC4918] path at
this endpoint. In order to access a Remote Resource,
implementations MAY use this path as a prefix, or as the
full path (see sharing examples).
o webapp (string) - The top-level path for web apps at this
endpoint. This value is provided for documentation
purposes, and it SHOULD NOT be intended as a prefix for
share requests.
o datatx (string) - The top-level path used for data
transfers. This value is provided for documentation
purposes, and it SHOULD NOT be intended as a prefix. In
addition, implementations are expected to execute the
transfer using WebDAV [RFC4918] as the wire protocol.
o Any additional protocol supported for this Resource type MAY
be advertised here, where the value MAY correspond to a top-
level URI to be used for that protocol.
* OPTIONAL: capabilities (array of string) - The optional
capabilities supported by this OCM Server. As implementations
MUST accept Share Creation Notifications to be compliant, it is
not necessary to expose that as a capability. Example: ["receive-
code", "webdav-uri"]. The array MAY include for instance: _
"enforce-mfa" - to indicate that this OCM Server can apply a
Sending Server's MFA requirements for a Share on their behalf. _
"webdav-uri" - to indicate that this OCM Server can append a
relative URI to the path listed for WebDAV [RFC4918] in the
appropriate resourceTypes entry "protocol-object" - to indicate
that this OCM Server can receive a Share Creation Notification
whose protocol object contains one property per supported protocol
instead of containing the standard name and options properties. _
"invites" - to indicate the server would support acting as an
Invite Sender or Invite Receiver OCM Server. This might be useful
for suggesting to a user that existing contacts might be upgraded
to the more secure (and possibly required) invite flow. _
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 15]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
"receive-code" - to indicate that this OCM Server can receive a
code as part of a Share Creation Notification, and exchange it for
a bearer token at the Sending Server's /token API endpoint. _
"invite-wayf" - to indicate that this OCM Server exposes a WAYF
Page to facilitate the Invite flow.
* OPTIONAL: criteria (array of string) - The criteria for accepting
a Share Creation Notification. As all Receiving Servers SHOULD
require the use of TLS in API calls, it is not necessary to expose
that as a criterium. Example: ["http-request-signatures",
"code"]. The array MAY include for instance: _ "http-request-
signatures" - to indicate that API requests without http
signatures will be rejected. _ "code" - to indicate that API
requests without code will be rejected (i.e. the sharedSecret in
the protocol details will be ignored). _ "denylist" - some servers
MAY be blocked based on their IP address _ "allowlist" - unknown
servers MAY be blocked based on their IP address * "invite" - an
invite MUST have been exchanged between the sender and the
receiver before a Share Creation Notification can be sent
* OPTIONAL: publicKey (object) - The signatory used to sign outgoing
request to confirm its origin. The signatory is optional, but if
present, it MUST contain two string fields, id and publicKeyPem.
properties:
- REQUIRED keyId (string) unique id of the key in URI format.
The hostname set the origin of the request and MUST be
identical to the current discovery endpoint. Example:
https://my-cloud-storage.org/ocm#signature
- REQUIRED publicKeyPem (string) - PEM-encoded version of the
public key. Example: "----BEGIN PUBLIC KEY----\n...\n----END
PUBLIC KEY----\n"
* OPTIONAL: inviteAcceptDialog (string) - URL path of a web page
where a user can accept an invite, when query parameters "token"
and "providerDomain" are provided. Implementations that offer the
"invites" capability SHOULD provide this URL as well in order to
enhance the UX of the Invite Flow. If for example
"/index.php/apps/sciencemesh/accept" is specified here then a WAYF
Page SHOULD redirect the end-user to /index.php/apps/sciencemesh/
accept?token=zi5kooKu3ivohr9a&providerDomain=example.com.
6. Share Creation Notification
To create a Share, the Sending Server SHOULD make a HTTP POST request
* to the /shares path in the Receiving Server's OCM API
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 16]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
* using application/json as the Content-Type HTTP request header
* its request body containing a JSON document representing an object
with the fields as described below
* using TLS
* using httpsig [RFC9421]
6.1. Fields
* REQUIRED shareWith (string) OCM Address of the user, group or
federation the provider wants to share the Resource with. This
MUST be known in advance, either via a previous Invitation or
through other means. Example:
"51dc30ddc473d43a6011e9ebba6ca770@geant.org"
* REQUIRED name (string) Name of the Resource (file or folder).
Example: "resource.txt"
* OPTIONAL description (string) Optional description of the Resource
(file or folder). Example: "This is the Open API Specification
file (in YAML format) of the Open Cloud Mesh API."
* REQUIRED providerId (string) Identifier to identify the Shared
Resource at the provider side. This is unique per provider such
that if the same Resource is shared twice, this providerId will
not be repeated. Example: 7c084226-d9a1-11e6-bf26-cec0c932ce01
* REQUIRED owner (string) - OCM Address of the user who owns the
Resource. Example: "6358b71804dfa8ab069cf05ed1b0ed2a@apiwise.nl"
* REQUIRED sender (string) - OCM Address of the user that wants to
share the Resource. Example:
"527bd5b5d689e2c32ae974c6229ff785@apiwise.nl"
* OPTIONAL ownerDisplayName (string) Display name of the owner of
the Resource Example: "Dimitri"
* OPTIONAL senderDisplayName (string) Display name of the user that
wants to share the Resource Example: "John Doe"
* REQUIRED shareType (string) SHOULD have a value of "user",
"group", or "federation", to indicate that the first part of the
shareWith OCM Address refers to a Receiving Party who is a single
user of the Receiving Server, a group of users at the Receiving
Servers, or a group of users that is spread out over various
servers, including at least one user at the Receiving Server.
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 17]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
* REQUIRED resourceType (string) Resource type (file, calendar,
contact, ...)
* OPTIONAL expiration (integer) The expiration time for the OCM
share, in seconds of UTC time since Unix epoch. If omitted, it is
assumed that the share does not expire.
* OPTIONAL code (string) A nonce to be exchanged for a (potentially
short-lived) bearer token at the Sending Server's /token endpoint.
* REQUIRED protocol (object) JSON object with specific options for
each protocol. The supported protocols are: - webdav, to access
the data - webapp, to access remote web applications - datatx, to
transfer the data to the remote endpoint.
Other custom protocols might be added in the future.
In case a single protocol is offered, there are three ways to
specify this object:
Option 1: Set the `name` field to the name of the protocol,
and put the protocol details in a field named `options`.
Option 2: Set the `name` field to the name of the protocol,
and put the protocol details in a field carrying the name of
the protocol.
Option 3: Set the `name` field to `multi`, and put the
protocol details in a field carrying the name of the protocol.
Option 1 using the `options` field is now deprecated.
Implementations are encouraged to transition to the new
optional properties defined below, such that this field
may be removed in a future major version of the spec.
When specifying more than one protocol as different ways to
access the Share, the `name` field needs to be set to `multi`.
If multi is given, one or more protocol endpoints are expected to be
defined according to the optional properties specified below.
Otherwise, at least webdav is expected to be supported, and its
options MAY be given in the opaque options payload for compatibility
with v1.0 implementations (see examples). Note though that this
format is deprecated. Warning: client implementers should be aware
that v1.1 servers MAY support both webdav and multi, but v1.0 servers
MAY only support webdav.
* Protocol details for webdav MAY contain:
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 18]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
- REQUIRED uri (string) A URI to access the Remote Resource. The
URI SHOULD be relative, in which case the prefix exposed by the
/.well-known/ocm endpoint MUST be used. Absolute URIs are
deprecated.
- OPTIONAL sharedSecret (string) - REQUIRED if no code field is
given for the Share as a whole (see above). An optional secret
to be used to access the Resource, such as a bearer token. To
prevent leaking it in logs it MUST NOT appear in any URI.
- OPTIONAL permissions (array of strings) - The permissions
granted to the sharee. A subset of: - read allows read-only
access including download of a copy. - write allows create,
update, and delete rights on the Resource. - share allows re-
share rights on the Resource.
- OPTIONAL requirements (array of strings) - The requirements
that the sharee MUST fulfill to access the Resource. A subset
of: - mfa-enforced requires the consumer to be MFA-
authenticated. This MAY be used if the recipient provider
exposes the enforce-mfa capability. - use-code requires the
consumer to exchange the given code via a signed HTTPS request.
This MAY be used if the recipient provider exposes the receive-
code capability.
* Protocol details for webapp MAY contain:
- REQUIRED uri (string) A URI to a client-browsable view of the
Shared Resource, such that users MAY use the web applications
available at the site. The URI SHOULD be relative, in which
case the prefix exposed by the /.well-known/ocm endpoint MUST
be used. Absolute URIs are deprecated.
- REQUIRED viewMode (string) The permissions granted to the
sharee. A subset of: - view allows access to the web app in
view-only mode. - read allows read and download access via the
web app. - write allows full editing rights via the web app.
- OPTIONAL sharedSecret (string) An optional secret to be used to
access the remote web app, for example in the form of a bearer
token.
* Protocol details for datatx MAY contain:
- REQUIRED srcUri (string) A URI to access the Remote Resource.
The URI SHOULD be relative, in which case the prefix exposed by
the /.well-known/ocm endpoint MUST be used. Absolute URIs are
deprecated.
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 19]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
- OPTIONAL sharedSecret (string) An optional secret to be used to
access the Resource, for example in the form of a bearer token.
To prevent leaking it in logs it MUST NOT appear in any URI.
- OPTIONAL size (integer) The size of the file to be transferred
from the sending server.
6.2. Decision to Discard
The Receiving Server MAY discard the notification if any of the
following hold true:
* the HTTP Signature is missing but the Sending Server does expose a
keypair discoverable from the FQDN part of the sender field in the
request body
* the HTTP Signature is missing
* the HTTP Signature is not valid
* no keypair is trusted or discoverable from the FQDN part of the
sender field in the request body
* the keypair used to generate the HTTP Signature doesn't match the
one trusted or discoverable from the FQDN part of the sender field
in the request body
* the Sending Server is denylisted
* the Sending Server is not allowlisted
* the Sending Party is not trusted by the Receiving Party (e.g., no
Invite was exchanged and/or the Sending Party's OCM Address does
not appear in the Receiving Party's address book)
* the Receiving Server is unable to act as an API client for (any
of) the protocol(s) listed for accessing the Resource
* an initial check shows that the Resource cannot successfully be
accessed through (any of) the protocol(s) listed
7. Receiving Party Notification
If the Share Creation Notification is not discarded by the Receiving
Server, they MAY notify the Receiving Party passively by adding the
Share to some inbox list, and MAY also notify them actively through
for instance a push notification or an email message.
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 20]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
They could give the Receiving Party the option to accept or reject
the share, or add the share automatically and only send an
informational notification that this happened.
8. Share Acceptance Notification
In response to a Share Creation Notification, the Receiving Server
MAY discover the OCM API of the Sending Server, starting from the
<fqdn> part of the sender field in the Share Creation Notification.
If the OCM API of the Sending Server is successfully discovered, the
Receiving Server MAY make a HTTP POST request
* to the /notifications path in the Sending Server's OCM API
* using application/json as the Content-Type HTTP request header
* its request body containing a JSON document representing an object
with the fields as described below
* using TLS
* using httpsig [RFC9421]
8.1. Fields
* REQUIRED notificationType (string) - in a Share Acceptance
Notification it MUST be one of:
- 'SHARE_ACCEPTED'
- 'SHARE_DECLINED'
* REQUIRED providerId (string) - copied from the Share Creation
Notification for the Share this notification is about
* OPTIONAL resourceType (string) - copied from the Share Creation
Notification for the Share this notification is about
* OPTIONAL notification (object) - optional additional parameters,
depending on the notification and the resource type
For example, a notification MAY be sent by a recipient to let the
provider know that the recipient declined a share. In this case, the
provider site MAY mark the share as declined for its user(s).
Similarly, it MAY be sent by a provider to let the recipient know
that the provider removed a given share, such that the recipient MAY
clean it up from its database. A notification MAY also be sent to
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 21]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
let a recipient know that the provider removed that recipient from
the list of trusted users, along with any related share. The
recipient MAY reciprocally remove that provider from the list of
trusted users, along with any related share.
Notifications from Sending Server to Receiving Server SHOULD use
httpsig [RFC9421] so the Receiving Server can authenticate the origin
of the notification. Receiving Servers SHOULD decline notifications
from Sending Servers without httpsig as it can't identify where the
notification is coming from.
8.1.1. Receiving Party Notification
If the Share Creation Notification is not discarded by the Receiving
Server, they MAY notify the Receiving Party passively by adding the
Share to some inbox list, and MAY also notify them actively through
for instance a push notification or an email message.
They could give the Receiving Party the option to accept or reject
the Share, or add the Share automatically and only send an
informational notification that this happened.
9. Resource Access
To access the Resource, the Receiving Server MAY use multiple ways,
depending on the body of the Share Creation Notification. The
procedure is as follows:
1. The receiver MUST extract the OCM Server FQDN from the sender
field of the received share, and MUST query the Discovery
(Section 5) endpoint at that address: the
resourceTypes[0].protocols.webdav value is the <sender-ocm-path>
to be used in step 3.
2. If code is not empty, the receiver SHOULD make a signed POST
request to the /token path inside the Sending Server's OCM API,
to exchange the code for a short-lived bearer token, and then use
that bearer token to access the Resource.
3. If protocol.name = webdav, the receiver SHOULD inspect the
protocol.options property. If it contains a sharedSecret, as in
the legacy example (https://cs3org.github.io/OCM-API/
docs.html?branch=develop&repo=OCM-
API&user=cs3org#/paths/~1shares/post), then the receiver SHOULD
make a HTTP PROPFIND request to https://<sharedSecret>:@<sender-
host><sender-ocm-path>. Note that this access method, based on
Basic Auth, is _deprecated_ and may be removed in a future
release of the Protocol.
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 22]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
4. Otherwise, if protocol.name = multi, the receiver MUST inspect
the protocol.webdav.uri property: if it's a complete URI, the
receiver MUST make a HTTP PROPFIND request against it to access
the Remote Resource. If it only contains an identifier <key>,
the receiver MUST make a HTTP PROPFIND request to
https://<sender-host><sender-ocm-path>/<key> in order to access
the Remote Resource. Additionally, the receiver MUST pass an
Authorization: bearer header with either the short-lived bearer
token obtained in step 2, if applicable, or the
protocol.webdav.sharedSecret value.
In all cases, in case the Shared Resource is a folder and the
Receiving Server accesses a Resource within that shared folder, it
SHOULD append its relative path to that URL. In other words, the
Sending Server SHOULD support requests to URLs such as
https://<sender-host><sender-ocm-path>/path/to/resource.txt.
Additionally, if protocol.<protocolname>.requirements includes mfa-
enforced, the Receiving Server MUST ensure that the Receiving Party
has been authenticated with MFA, or prompt the consumer in order to
elevate their session, if applicable.
10. Share Deletion
A "SHARE_ACCEPTED" notification followed by a "SHARE_UNSHARED"
notification is equivalent to a "SHARE_DECLINED" notification.
Note that the Sending Server MAY at any time revoke access to a
Resource (effectively undoing or deleting the Share) without
notifying the Receiving Server.
11. Share Updating
Some implementations have experimented with a
"RESHARE_CHANGE_PERMISSION"notification, but the payload and side
effects such a notification may have are out of scope of this version
of this specification. The Receiving Party sending such a
notification has no way of knowing if the Sending Party understood
and processed the reshare request or not.
12. Resharing
The "REQUEST_RESHARE" and "RESHARE_UNDO" notification types MAY be
used by the Receiving Server to persuade the Sending Server to share
the same Resource with another Receiving Party. The details of the
payload and side effects such a notification may have are out of
scope of this version of this specification. Note that the Receiving
Party sending such a notification has no way of knowing if the
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 23]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
Sending Party understood and processed the reshare request or not.
13. IANA Considerations
This document has no IANA actions.
14. Security Considerations
14.1. Trust
There are several areas that are not covered by this specification.
Most importantly we do not provide a way of establishing trust
between servers, even though some features of the protocol rely on
trust, such as the mfa-enforced requirement.
Trust needs to be established out of band, but there are some
features of the protocol that _can_ be used to assist operators in
establishing trust. For instance, invite flow can be used to
establish that users know and have out of band connections with other
users on an OCM server.
Further more the Directory Service feature can be used to establish a
trusted federation, where a central authority can be trusted to
implement measures for auditing and adding only trusted servers into
the discovery service.
14.1.1. httpsig
It is RECOMMENDED to use signed messages, "httpsig" [RFC9421], to
verify that an OCM server is the server you expect it to be, and
SHOULD be done unless you have a niche use case.
14.2. Legacy shared secrets
The legacy format of an OCM Share Notification with shared secrets is
only provided for backwards compatibility with existing
implementations. Implementers SHOULD NOT use it and prefer short-
lived tokens instead.
15. References
15.1. Normative References
[RFC2119] Bradner, S. "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
Requirement Levels (https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc2119)",
March 1997.
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 24]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
[RFC4918] Dusseault, L. M. "HTTP Extensions for Web Distributed
Authoring and Versioning (https://datatracker.ietf.org/html/
rfc4918/)", June 2007.
[RFC8174] Leiba, B. "Ambiguity of Uppercase vs Lowercase in RFC 2119
Key Words (https://datatracker.ietf.org/html/rfc8174)", May 2017.
[RFC9421] Backman, A., Richer, J. and Sporny, M. "HTTP Message
Signatures (https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc9421)", February 2024.
15.2. Informative References
[RFC6749] Hardt, D. (ed), "The OAuth 2.0 Authorization Framework
(https://datatracker.ietf.org/html/rfc6749)", October 2012.
16. Appendix A: Multi-factor Authentication
If a Receiving Server exposes the capability enforce-mfa, it
indicates that it will try and comply with a MFA requirement set on a
Share. If the Sending Server trusts the Receiving Server, the
Sending Server MAY set the requirement mfa-enforced on a Share, which
the Receiving Server MUST honor. A compliant Receiving Server that
signals that it is MFA-capable MUST NOT allow access to a Resource
protected with the mfa-enforced requirement, if the Receiving Party
has not provided a second factor to establish their identity with
greater confidence.
Since there is no way to guarantee that the Receiving Server will
actually enforce the MFA requirement, it is up to the Sending Server
to establish a trust with the Receiving Server such that it is
reasonable to assume that the Receiving Server will honor the MFA
requirement. This establishment of trust will inevitably be
implementation dependent, and can be done for example using a pre
approved allow list of trusted Receiving Servers. The procedure of
establishing trust is out of scope for this specification: a
mechanism similar to the ScienceMesh (https://sciencemesh.io)
integration for the Invite (Section 4.5) capability may be envisaged.
17. Appendix B: Request Signing
A request is signed by adding the signature in the headers. The
sender also needs to expose the public key used to generate the
signature. The receiver can then validate the signature and
therefore the origin of the request. To help debugging, it is
RECOMMENDED to also add all properties used in the signature as
headers, even if they can easily be re-generated from the payload.
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 25]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
Note: Signed requests prove the identity of the sender but do not
encrypt nor affect its payload.
Here is an example of headers needed to sign a request.
{ "@request-target": "post /path", "content-length": 380, "date":
"Mon, 08 Jul 2024 14:16:20 GMT", "content-digest": "SHA-
256=U7gNVUQiixe5BRbp4...", "host": "hostname.of.the.recipient",
"Signature": "keyId=\"https://author.hostname/key\",algorithm= \"rsa-
sha256\",headers=\"content-length date digest host\",
signature=\"DzN12OCS1rsA[...]o0VmxjQooRo6HHabg==\"" }
* '@request-target' (optional) contains the reached endpoint and the
used method,
* 'content-length' is the total length of the payload of the
request,
* 'date' is the date and time when the request has been sent,
* 'content-digest' is a checksum of the payload of the request,
* 'host' is the hostname of the recipient of the request (remote
when signing outgoing request, local on incoming request),
* 'Signature' contains the signature generated using the private key
and details on its generation:
- 'keyId' is a unique id, formatted as an url; hostname is used
to retrieve the public key via custom discovery
- 'algorithm' specify the algorithm used to generate signature
- 'headers' specify the properties used when generating the
signature
- 'signature' the signature of an array containing the properties
listed in 'headers'. Some properties like content-length,
date, content-digest, and host are mandatory to protect against
authenticity override.
17.1. How to generate the Signature for outgoing request
After properties are set in the headers, the Signature is generated
and added to the list.
This is a pseudo-code example for generating the Signature header for
outgoing requests:
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 26]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
``` headers = { 'content-length': length_of(payload), # Use a
function to get the current GMT date as 'D, d M Y H:i:s T' 'date':
current_gmt_datetime(), 'content-digest': 'SHA-256=' +
base64_encode(hash('sha256', utf8_encode(payload))), 'host':
'recipient-fqdn', }
signed = ssl_sign(concatenate_with_newlines(headers), private_key,
'sha256') signature = { 'keyId': 'sender.fqdn', # The sending
server's FQDN 'algorithm': 'rsa-sha256', 'headers': 'content-length
date content-digest host', 'signature': signed, }
headers['Signature'] = format_signature(signature) ```
17.2. How to confirm Signature on incoming request
The first step would be to confirm the validity of each properties:
* content-length and content-digest can be regenerated and compared
from the payload of the request,
* a maximum TTL MUST be applied to date and current timestamp,
* regarding data contained in the Signature header:
- using keyId to get the public key from remote signatory,
- headers is used to generate the clear version of the signature
and MUST contain at least content-length, date, content-digest
and host,
- signature is the encrypted version of the signature.
Here is an example of how to verify the signature using the headers,
the signature and the public key:
``` clear = { 'content-length': length_of(payload), 'date': 'Mon, 08
Jul 2024 14:16:20 GMT', 'content-digest': 'SHA-256=' +
base64_encode(hash('sha256', utf8_encode(payload))), # Recompute
digest for verification 'host': 'sender-fqdn', }
signed = headers['Signature'] verification_result =
ssl_verify(concatenate_with_newlines(clear), signed, public_key,
'sha256')
if not verification_result then raise InvalidSignatureException ```
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 27]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
17.3. Validating the payload
Following the validation of the signature, the host SHOULD also
confirm the validity of the payload, that is ensuring that the
actions implied in the payload actually initiated on behalf of the
source of the request.
As an example, if the payload is about initiating a new share, the
file owner has to be an account from the instance at the origin of
the request.
18. Appendix C: Directory Service
A third-party Directory Service is a back-end service used to
federate multiple OCM Servers and facilitate the Invite flow. It is
expected to expose, via anonymous HTTP GET, a JSON document with the
following format:
* REQUIRED: federation - a human-readable name for the list of OCM
Servers exposed by the Directory Service
* REQUIRED: servers - a JSON array of objects to describe the list
of OCM Servers with the following string fields:
- REQUIRED: url - an absolute URL identifying the OCM Server. It
MUST:
o include scheme: either https:// or (for testing purposes)
http://
o include host (either a FQDN or an IP address)
o MAY include a non-default port
o MUST NOT include a base path (e.g., /ocm)
o MUST NOT include userinfo, query, or fragment
- REQUIRED: displayName - a human-readable name for the OCM
Server Example:
json { "federation": "The ScienceMesh Directory", "servers": [ {
"url": "https://ocm-server-1.example.org", "displayName": "OCM Server
1" }, { "url": "https://ocm-server-2.example.org:4443",
"displayName": "OCM Server 2" }, { "url": "http://192.168.1.1:8080",
"displayName": "OCM Server 3" } ] }
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 28]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
19. Acknowledgements
Our deepest thanks and appreciation go to the people who started the
work on what would become this specification in 2015. In particular
we want to thank (in alphabetical order) Guido Aben, Russell Albert,
Holger Angenent, David Antoš, Hrachya Astsatryan, Kurt Bauer, Charles
du Jeu, Andreas Eckey, David Gillard, Andranik Hayrapetyan Wahi,
Christoph Herzog, David Jericho, Frank Karlitschek, Christian
Kracher, Ralph Krimmel, Massimo Lamanna, Simon Leinen, Jari
Miettinen, Jakub Moscicki, Frederik Orellana, Vlad Roman, Christian
Schmitz, Woojin Seok, Rogier Spoor, Christian Sprajc, Peter Szegedi,
Ron Trompert, Benedikt Wegmann and Johnatan Xu.
We would also like to thank Ishank Arora, Gianmaria Del Monte, Jörn
Friedrich Dreyer, Richard Freitag, Hugo González Labrador, Matthias
Kraus, Maxence Lange, Lovisa Lugnegård, Sandro Mesterheide, Antoon
Prins and Björn Schießle for their direct contributions to the
specification.
Over the years many more people have been involved in the development
of OCM. We would like to thank all of them for their contributions,
including Jean-Thomas Acquaviva, Samuel Alfageme Sainz, Karsten
Asshauer, Miroslav Bauer, Felix Böhm, Maciej Brzeźniak, Diogo Castro,
Gavin Charles Kennedy, Jarosław Czub, Milan Danecek, Michael D'Silva,
Lukasz Dutka, Pedro Ferreira, Renato Furter, Klaas Freitag, Raman
Ganguly, Eva Gergely, Hilary Goodson, Daniel Halbe, Dave Heyns, Jan
Holesovsky, Jan Hornicek, Carina Kemp, Fergus Kerins, Andreas Klotz,
Matthias Knoll, Christian Kracher, Mario Lassnig, Claudius Laumanns,
Anthony Leroy, Patrick Maier, Vladislav Makarenko, Anna Manou, Rita
Meneses, Zheng Meyer-Zhao, Crystal Michelle Chua, Yoann Moulin,
Daniel Müller, Frederik Müller, Rasmus Munk, Michał Orzechowski,
Jacek Pawel Kitowski, Iosif Peterfi, Alessandro Petraro, Rene Ranger,
Angelo Romasanta, David Rousse, Carla Sauvanaud, Klaus
Scheibenberger, Marcin Sieprawski, Tilo Steiger, C.D. Tiwari,
Alejandro Unger and Tom Wezepoel.
Authors' Addresses
Giuseppe Lo Presti
CERN
Email: giuseppe.lopresti@cern.ch
URI: http://cern.ch/lopresti
Michiel de Jong
Ponder Source
Email: michiel@pondersource.org
URI: https://pondersource.com
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 29]
Internet-Draft Open Cloud Mesh August 2025
Mahdi Baghbani
Ponder Source
Email: mahdi@pondersource.org
URI: https://pondersource.com
Micke Nordin
SUNET
Email: kano@sunet.se
URI: https://code.smolnet.org/micke
Lo Presti, et al. Expires 21 February 2026 [Page 30]