Re: [tcpm] Linux doesn’t implement RFC3465

[Neal Cardwell <[e-mail]>]

On Thu, Jul 29, 2021 at 10:06 AM Mark Allman <[e-mail]> wrote:

>
> >>     (b) If there is no burst mitigation then we have to figure out
> >>         if L is still useful for this purpose and whether we want to
> >>         retain it.  Seems like perhaps L=2 is sensible here.  L was
> >>         never meant to be some general burst mitigator.  However,
> >>         ABC clearly *can* aggravate bursting and so perhaps it makes
> >>         sense to have it also try to limit the impact of the
> >>         aggravation (in the absence of some general mechanism).
> >
> > Even if recommending a static L value, IMHO L=2 is a bit
> > conservative.
>
> Well, perhaps.  L=2 was designed to exactly counteract delayed ACKs.
> So, it isn't exactly a new magic number.  We could wave our hands
> and say "5 seems OK" or "10 seems OK" or whatever.  And, I am sure
> we could come up with something that folks felt was fine.  However,
> my feeling is that if we want to worry about bursts then let's worry
> about bursts in some generic way.  And, if you have some way to deal
> with bursts then L isn't needed.  And, if you don't have a way to
> deal with bursts then a conservative L seems fine.  But, perhaps
> putting the effort into a generic mechanism instead of cooking yet
> another magic number we need to periodically refresh is probably a
> better way to spend effort.
>

Yes, I very much agree that "putting the effort into a generic mechanism
instead of cooking yet another magic number we need to periodically refresh
is probably a better way to spend effort."

>
> >>   - During slow starts that follow RTOs there is a general
> >>     problem that just because the window slides by X bytes
> >>     doesn't say anything about the *network*, as that sliding can
> >>     happen because much of the data was likely queued for the
> >>     application on the receiver.  So, e.g., you can RTO and send
> >>     one packet and get an ACK back that slides the window 10
> >>     packets.  That doesn't mean 10 packets left.  It means one
> >>     packet left the network and nine packets are eligible to be
> >>     sent to the application.  So, it is not OK to set the cwnd to
> >>     1+10 = 11 packets in response to this ACK.  Here L should
> >>     exist and be 1.
> >
> > AFAICT this argument only applies to non-SACK connections. For
> > connections with SACK (the vast majority of connections over the
> > public Internet and in datacenters), it is quite feasible to
> > determine how many packets really left the network (and Linux TCP
> > does this; see below).
>
> If you have an accurate way to figure out how many of the ACKed
> bytes left the network and how many were just buffered at the
> receiver then I see no problem with increasing based on byte count
> as you do in the initial slow start.
>
> (I don't remember what the paper you cite says, but my guess is it's
> often the case that L=1 is a reasonable substitute for something
> complicated here.  But, perhaps I am running the simulation in my
> head wrong ... it has been a while, admittedly!)
>
> > Yes, offload mechanisms are so pervasive in practice,
>
> I am trying to build a mental model here.  How pervasive would you
> guess these are?  And, where in the network?  I have assumed that
> they are for sure pervasive in data centers and server farms, but
> not for the vast majority of Internet-connected devices.
>

>From my impression looking at public Internet traces, aggregation
mechanisms that cause TCP ACKs for more than 2 segments are very common. I
suspect that's because the majority of public Internet traffic these days
has a bottleneck that is either wifi, cellular, or DOCSIS, and all of these
have a shared medium with a large latency overhead for L2 MAC control of
gets to speak next. So a lot of batching happens, both in big batches of
data that arrive at the client in the same L2 medium time slot, and big
batches of ACKs that accumulate while the client waits (often several
milliseconds, sometimes even tens of milliseconds) for its chance to send a
big stretch ACK or batch of ACKs.

This brings up a related point: even if there is some ABC-style per-ACK L
limit on cwnd increases, the time structure of most public Internet ACK
streams is massively bursty because of these aggregation mechanisms
inherent in L2 behavior on most public Internet bottlenecks (wifi,
cellular, DOCSIS). So even if there is a limit L that limits the per-ACK
behavior to be smooth, if there is no pacing of data segments then the data
transmit time structure will still be bursty because the ACK arrivals these
days are very bursty.

best regards,
neal