Re: Genart last call review of draft-ietf-quic-applicability-14

["Brian Trammell (IETF)" <[e-mail]>]

hi Ines,

Many thanks for the review! We've proposed alternate text to address the issue in https://github.com/quicwg/ops-drafts/pull/451.

NEW:

Measurement studies have shown between three {{Trammell16}} and
five {{Swett16}} percent of networks block all UDP traffic, though there
is little evidence of other forms of systematic disadvantage to UDP traffic
compared to TCP {{Edeline16}}. This blocking implies that all applications
running on top of QUIC must either be prepared to accept connectivity failure
on such networks, or be engineered to fall back to some other transport
protocol. In the case of HTTP, this fallback is TLS over TCP.


We'd like to keep the systematic disadvantage language and the reference to
Edeline, as it underscores the fact that the majority of expected UDP
disadvantage is simple blockage, thereby making fallback a viable strategy.

We did strike "recent" -- the adjective applied when the text was written in 2017.

Thanks again, cheers,

Brian

> On 8 Feb 2022, at 01:03, Ines Robles via Datatracker <[e-mail]> wrote:
> 
> Reviewer: Ines Robles
> Review result: Ready with Issues
> 
> I am the assigned Gen-ART reviewer for this draft. The General Area
> Review Team (Gen-ART) reviews all IETF documents being processed
> by the IESG for the IETF Chair.  Please treat these comments just
> like any other last call comments.
> 
> For more information, please see the FAQ at
> 
> <https://trac.ietf.org/trac/gen/wiki/GenArtfaq>.
> 
> Document: draft-ietf-quic-applicability-14
> Reviewer: Ines Robles
> Review Date: 2022-02-07
> IETF LC End Date: 2022-02-07
> IESG Telechat date: Not scheduled for a telechat
> 
> Summary:
> 
> This document discusses the applicability of the QUIC transport protocol,
> focusing on caveats impacting application protocol  development and deployment
> over QUIC.  The document is well written and clear.
> 
> I have one minor issue.
> 
> Major issues: None
> 
> Minor issues:
> 
> Section 2 on the sentence:
> 
> "While recent measurements have shown no evidence of a widespread,  systematic
> disadvantage of UDP traffic compared to TCP in the Internet"
> 
> Statement of "no evidence of a widespread,  systematic disadvantage" may be
> seen as misleading when the example is about networks that simply block UDP
> traffic without considering other possible disadvantages, moreover when one of
> the references specifically states the opposite "3% failure is a lot".
> Additionally references are rather old (2016) materials. Suggestion for
> avoidance of doubt:
> 
> "Measurements have shown 3-5% of networks blocking UDP, constituting a
> disadvantage of UDP traffic compared to TCP in the Internet [Edeline16],
> [Trammell16] [Swett16].  All applications running on top of QUIC must
> therefore..."
> 
> Nits: None
> 
> Thanks for this document,
> Ines.
> 
>