Bundle protocol mail convergence layer

Abstract

In the past many research prototypes employed a DTN to provide mail services to remote areas. This work proposes the opposite: Using SMTP and IMAP to transport the Bundle Protocol (BP). Despite the obvious feasibility of such a scheme, we will show that the Mail Convergence Layer (MCL) provides advantages over other Convergence Layers and can qualitatively enhance the capabilities of a DTN.Each DTN node has an associated mailbox that can be used to deposit bundles, if the node is absent. In this case a mail server e↵ectively acts as an intermediate always-on DTN node without the need to deploy a BP router. We will present the motivation and the concept of the MCL as well as an open-source implementation.