Re: [v6ops] Flow Label Load Balancing

[Fernando Gont <[e-mail]>]

Hi, Tom,

On 24/11/20 16:43, Tom Herbert wrote:
[....]
> Modulating the flow label is a means to affect the routing of packets
> through the network that uses flow labels as input to the ECMP hash.

What's the point?

1) You cannot tell *if* the FL is being used.

2) Changing the FL does not necessarily mean that packets will employ a 
different link.

3) If the network is failing, shouldn't you handle this via routing?



> The basic idea is that the flow label associated with a connection is
> randomly changed when the stack observes that the connection is
> failing (e.g. and an RTO). There is nothing in the specs that prevents
> this since the source is at liberty to set the flow label as it sees
> fit.

The FL is expected to remain constant for the life of a flow. A 
retransmitted packet is part of the same flow as the 
originally-transmitted packet. So this seems to be contradicting the 
very specification of the FL.

For instance, If a RTO for a flow causes the FL to change, then one may 
possibly argue that the FL is not naming/labeling what is said/expected 
to be anming/labeling.



> The feature is useful in large datacenter networks, like
> pparently Facebook where the patches originate, since information
> discerned by TCP can opportunistically be applied to route selection.
> The practical issue is that there are stateful devices like firewalls
> that require consistent routing in the network in which case changing
> the flow label can confuse them. As I mentioned, the original intent
> was that the flow label randomization feature should be opt-in instead
> of on by default.

So... where is the "source" of the packet that would be "modulating" the FL?

Thanks,
-- 
Fernando Gont
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