[e2e] TCP "experiments"

[John Day]

Lachlan,

At 10:33 AM +1000 7/28/13, Lachlan Andrew wrote:
>Greetings John,
>
>On 28 July 2013 04:36, John Day <jeanjour at comcast.net> wrote:
>>  One never does experiments with a production network.
>>
>>  An arbitrary network of several hundred nodes
>>  or even a few thousand is not that big a deal.
>
>Greetings John,
>
>You are absolutely right that testbed experiments should be performed
>before "live" experiments.  However, it is not so much the size of the
>network as the mix of applications running on it that makes the test
>representative.  It is still very difficult to perform a test with a
>few thousand human users all doing their thing.  That means that live
>experiments still have a place.

Are you telling me that we don't have good statistical models for the 
behavior of large numbers of users?   I would suggest that this is 
just laziness, irresponsible behavior or both.

>
>Of course, that doesn't excuse un-monitored deployments as occurred
>when Linux started using BIC as the default.  To my mind, the solution
>would be for the IETF to provide more practical guidance on how to
>perform limited-scale, monitored tests on the real Internet.

That is not the job of an organization dedicated to the maintenance 
of a production network.

>The
>process of getting a protocol "approved", even as an experimental RFC,
>is far too cumbersome for most researchers, especially since there is
>no way to police the use of non-approved protocols.

Have you ever seen what researchers in other fields do to ensure that 
they get accurate and reliable results?  Triple distillations, 
putting precisely the same amount in 2000 test tubes, making your own 
reagents?  O, these poor CS researchers might have to actually do 
some real science.

I would question whether it is the job of *researchers* to get a 
protocol approved by the IETF for use in product.  O, sorry, I 
forgot.  University researchers don't do research anymore, they are 
just cheap developers for big corporations, or wimps using tax 
dollars for angel funding from the safety of their tenure.

>  The IETF will be
>most relevant if its processes reflect its power.  We (or at least I)
>want the Internet to be inherited by those who try to play by the
>rules rather than those who flaunt them, but the if the only way to
>make timely progress is by breaking the rules then we won't achieve
>that (as we saw with CUBIC and NATs).  Getting the balance right is
>difficult, but important.

But you do have a good point.  I have some interesting ideas for more 
efficient use of the power grid, I think I will deploy them to see 
how they affect the balance of the grid.  Gee, what could go wrong!

Take care,
John

>$0.02,
>Lachlan
>
>--
>Lachlan Andrew  Centre for Advanced Internet Architectures (CAIA)
>Swinburne University of Technology, Melbourne, Australia
><http://caia.swin.edu.au/cv/landrew>
>Ph +61 3 9214 4837