Re: Proposal: drop QPACK encoder stream framing

[Ian Swett <[e-mail]>]

I'm not as much a QPACK expert as others on this thread, but I do agree
that it would be simpler without the length in this case, as well as saving
a few bytes.

On Fri, Jun 8, 2018 at 7:19 AM Kazuho Oku <[e-mail]> wrote:

> 2018-06-08 13:12 GMT+03:00 Martin Thomson <[e-mail]>:
> > I think that this is a reasonable request and I'd support this.  It
> > saves an encoder from having to buffer and it even saves a few octets.
> > The complexity increase (the increased need to delay acknowledgments)
> > is manageable and even encourages good practice - the current design
> > encourages a little bit of laziness because you can acknowledge at the
> > end of each block and have a reasonable expectation of it being
> > approximately correct... most of the time.
>
> +1
>
> Previously I had thought that having prefix has the possibility of
> simplifying the encoder. But I think I was wrong.
>
> If we have framing, we need to do either of the following:
>
> 1a. buffer the entire frame, and then iterate though the instructions,
> while checking for every instruction that it does not go beyond the
> end of the frame
> 1b. iterate though the instructions as they arrive, while checking
> that the entire instruction is available and that the instruction does
> not go beyond the end of the frame
>
> If we remove framing, the decoder can be implemented as:
>
> 2. iterate through the instructions as they arrive, while checking
> that the entire instruction is available
>
> As you can see, removing the framing simplifies the decoder design.
> Because it reduces one layer of variable-length encoding.
>
> > On Thu, Jun 7, 2018 at 5:11 PM Dmitri Tikhonov
> > <[e-mail]> wrote:
> >>
> >> Abstract
> >> --------
> >>
> >> The encoder block specified in Section 3.3 of draft-ietf-quic-qpack-00
> >> is unnecessary.  For reasons of efficiency, I propose that the framing
> >> be removed: let the encoder instructions be written and interpreted as
> >> a stream instead.
> >>
> >> Background
> >> ----------
> >>
> >> I brought this up during the first day (June 6) of the Kista Interim.
> >> Alan explained that there are two reasons for framing the instructions
> >> in this way on the encoder stream:
> >>
> >>     1. Historically, some (or most) HPACK decoders have struggled with
> >>        input that breaks in the middle of an instruction, as they do
> >>        not maintain state.
> >>
> >>     2. The blocks can be used as a clue to send Table State Synchronize
> >>        instructions on the decoder stream (Section 3.4.1).
> >>
> >> The downside to having length-prefixed blocks is that it makes it
> >> difficult to optimize encoding by writing to the outgoing packets
> >> directly.  One has to buffer the block, write the block length first,
> >> and then copy the block.
> >>
> >> Additionally, there is a potential for a deadlock (issue #1420).  Recall
> >> that QPACK owes its current form to the fact that the WG decided to
> >> prevent deadlocks at the compression protocol level, and not via
> advisory
> >> notes to the implementers.
> >>
> >> Reasons Behind the Block
> >> ------------------------
> >>
> >> First, let's look at the historical HPACK chokers.
> >>
> >> The HPACK decoder only processes HEADER blocks.  There is only one
> stream
> >> and thus only one HEADER block can be processed at a time.
> >>
> >> The QPACK decoder has to process two inputs: a) the encoder stream
> >> and b) HEADER blocks.  There is only one encoder stream.  This stream
> >> modifies the decoder state: the dynamic table.  The HEADER blocks do not
> >> modify the state.
> >>
> >> The HEADER blocks already come with a prefix length (HQ framing), and so
> >> QPACK implementations can choose to wait until the whole HEADER block is
> >> available.  It is processing of the encoder stream that is under
> >> consideration.
> >>
> >> With regards to the Table Synch signaling, the draft states that
> >>
> >>  "                                                         A decoder MAY
> >>  " coalesce multiple synchronization updates into a single update.
> >>
> >> This effectively means that the encoder already should not expect to get
> >> a one-to-one mapping between its Encoder Blocks and Table Synchs.
> >>
> >> Working with the Encoder Stream
> >> -------------------------------
> >>
> >> The dynamic table instruction stream can be thought of as its own state.
> >> Already, the QPACK decoder must be able to pause reading from streams
> when
> >> a blocked HEADERS block arrives.  Similar techniques can be used to
> resume
> >> reading from the encoder stream.  It should not be difficult to resume
> >> decoding a single instruction!  While breaking with the HPACK precedent
> >> (the hold-my-hand-I-need-buffer-size chokers), it keeps in line with the
> >> Seattle hum that the new compression mechanism is free from its HPACK
> >> shackles.
> >>
> >> Conclusion
> >> ----------
> >>
> >> Prefixing arbitrary sets of encoder instructions with a length denies
> >> zero-copy optimization opportunities.  At the cost of some slight
> >> complexity increase at the decoder, this framing mechanism can be
> >> dropped.  The proposed change is limited to just this -- technically
> >> superfluous -- piece.
> >>
> >>   - Dmitri.
> >>
> >> P.S.  An added bonus is some saved framing bytes on the encoder stream.
> >>       I believe the "compression performance above everything else" is
> >>       also the Working Group's consensus (Melbourne).
> >>
> >
>
>
>
> --
> Kazuho Oku
>
>