ndn-rs Wiki

Pre-release. ndn-rs is working toward its first stable tag (v0.1.0). The workspace version reads 0.1.0, but no git tag or GitHub Release has been published yet — this wiki documents main. Pull ghcr.io/quarmire/ndn-fwd:latest or build from source to try the current state. See the draft 0.1.0 release notes for the planned scope.

ndn-rs is a Named Data Networking (NDN) forwarder stack written in Rust. It models NDN as composable data pipelines with trait-based polymorphism, departing from the class hierarchy approach of NFD/ndn-cxx.

What is NDN?

Named Data Networking is a network architecture where communication is driven by named data rather than host addresses. Consumers request data by name (Interest packets), and the network locates and returns the data (Data packets). Every Data packet is cryptographically signed by its producer, enabling in-network caching and security that travels with the data.

Why ndn-rs?

• Library, not daemon – ForwarderEngine embeds in any Rust application
• Zero-copy pipeline – wire-format Bytes flow from recv to send without re-encoding
• Compile-time safety – packet ownership through the pipeline prevents use-after-short-circuit; SafeData typestate enforces verification
• Concurrent data structures – DashMap PIT, RwLock-per-node FIB trie, sharded CS
• Pluggable everything – faces, strategies, CS backends, and pipeline stages via traits
• Embedded to server – no_std TLV and packet crates run on Cortex-M; same code scales to multi-core routers

Navigating This Wiki

Crate Map

Binaries        ndn-fwd  ndn-tools  ndn-bench
                     |          |          |
Engine/App      ndn-engine  ndn-app  ndn-ipc  ndn-config  ndn-discovery
                     |          |        |
Pipeline        ndn-engine  ndn-strategy  ndn-security
                     |             |
Faces           ndn-faces  ndn-faces  ndn-faces  ndn-faces
                     |              |
Foundation      ndn-store  ndn-transport  ndn-packet  ndn-tlv
                                                         |
Embedded                                           ndn-embedded

Research        ndn-sim  ndn-compute  ndn-sync  ndn-research  ndn-strategy-wasm

Dependencies flow strictly downward. ndn-tlv and ndn-packet compile no_std.

{
  "columns": [
    { "label": "Foundation", "nodes": [
        {"id": "ndn-tlv"}, {"id": "ndn-packet"}, {"id": "ndn-store"},
        {"id": "ndn-transport"}, {"id": "ndn-embedded"}
    ]},
    { "label": "Faces", "nodes": [
        {"id": "ndn-faces"}, {"id": "ndn-faces"},
        {"id": "ndn-faces"}, {"id": "ndn-faces"}
    ]},
    { "label": "Pipeline & Strategy", "nodes": [
        {"id": "ndn-engine"}, {"id": "ndn-strategy"}, {"id": "ndn-security"}
    ]},
    { "label": "Engine & App", "nodes": [
        {"id": "ndn-engine"}, {"id": "ndn-app"}, {"id": "ndn-ipc"},
        {"id": "ndn-config"}, {"id": "ndn-discovery"}
    ]},
    { "label": "Binaries", "nodes": [
        {"id": "ndn-fwd"}, {"id": "ndn-tools"}, {"id": "ndn-bench"}
    ]}
  ],
  "satellites": {
    "label": "Research  (depend on engine / app / strategy)",
    "nodes": [
        {"id": "ndn-sim"}, {"id": "ndn-compute"},
        {"id": "ndn-sync"}, {"id": "ndn-strategy-wasm"}
    ]
  },
  "edges": [
    ["ndn-tlv",       "ndn-packet"],
    ["ndn-tlv",       "ndn-embedded"],
    ["ndn-packet",    "ndn-store"],
    ["ndn-packet",    "ndn-transport"],
    ["ndn-transport", "ndn-faces"],
    ["ndn-transport", "ndn-faces"],
    ["ndn-transport", "ndn-faces"],
    ["ndn-transport", "ndn-faces"],
    ["ndn-faces",    "ndn-engine"],
    ["ndn-faces",  "ndn-engine"],
    ["ndn-faces", "ndn-engine"],
    ["ndn-faces",     "ndn-engine"],
    ["ndn-store",       "ndn-engine"],
    ["ndn-engine",    "ndn-strategy"],
    ["ndn-engine",    "ndn-security"],
    ["ndn-strategy",    "ndn-engine"],
    ["ndn-security",    "ndn-engine"],
    ["ndn-engine",    "ndn-ipc"],
    ["ndn-engine",    "ndn-discovery"],
    ["ndn-engine",      "ndn-fwd"],
    ["ndn-engine",      "ndn-tools"],
    ["ndn-engine",      "ndn-bench"],
    ["ndn-app",         "ndn-ipc"],
    ["ndn-app",         "ndn-tools"],
    ["ndn-app",         "ndn-bench"],
    ["ndn-config",      "ndn-fwd"]
  ],
  "satellite_edges": [
    ["ndn-sim",           "ndn-engine"],
    ["ndn-compute",       "ndn-engine"],
    ["ndn-sync",          "ndn-app"],
    ["ndn-strategy-wasm", "ndn-strategy"]
  ]
}