[e2e] TCP improved closing strategies?

[William Allen Simpson]

Joe Touch wrote:
> William Allen Simpson wrote:
> ...
>> With several hundred thousand clients per minute using 65,000 ports.
> 
> The TCP state is supposed to be per socket pair (src/dst IP, src/dst
> port). So unless you're running those clients behind a single NAT - or
> keep track of only part of the state, this isn't an issue of port reuse.
> The issue is more likely consumption of kernel space.
> 
I've confirmed with Vixie.  Here's my interpretation of his shorthand.

The point of view of a busy recursive nameserver:

1) fin-wait-2 locks up the <ouraddress,ourport,theiraddress,theirport>
    tuple for 2*MSL.

2) ouraddress and ourport are both fixed.

3) fixed theiraddress, from our POV.

4) they've discarded state for theirport, usually this is due to NAT.

The solution requires an improved closing strategy, where the onus is
entirely on the session initiator.

There have been several suggestions in the literature.  Thanks again to
those that provided useful and interesting pointers.


>>...
>> Or reinventing the wheel (segmentation and retransmission over UDP).
> 
> A protocol that breaks a request into a 4-5 packets and does even a
> simple bit-mask NACK retransmission until they all get there isn't
> anywhere near as complex as TCP.
> 
> Some wheels don't need to be reinvented. Just dusted off and used where
> needed.
> 
Perhaps you'll enjoy reading:

   http://www.ietf.org/id/draft-barwood-dnsext-edns-page-option-00.txt

That's not the direction I'm heading....