Comment by jeffbee
2 days ago
This is a perspective, but just one of many. The overwhelming majority of IP flows are within data centers, not over planet-scale networks between unrelated parties.
2 days ago
This is a perspective, but just one of many. The overwhelming majority of IP flows are within data centers, not over planet-scale networks between unrelated parties.
I've never been convinced by an explanation of how QUIC applies for flows in the data center.
Ossification doesn't apply (or it shouldn't, IMHO, the point of Open Source software is that you can change it to fit your needs... if you don't like what upstream is doing, you should be running a local fork that does what you want... yeah, it's nicer if it's upstreamed, but try running a local fork of Windows or MacOS); you can make congestion control work for you when you control both sides; enterprise switches and routers aren't messing with tcp flows. If you're pushing enough traffic that this is an issue, the cost of QUIC seems way too high to justify, even if it helps with some issues.
I don't see why this exception to the end-to-end principle should exist. At the scale of single hosts today, with hundreds of CPUs and hundreds of tenants in a single system sharing a kernel, the kernel itself becomes an unwanted middlebox.
Unless you're using QUIC as some kind of datacenter-to-datacenter protocol (basically as SCTP on steroids with TLS), I don't think QUIC in the datacenter makes much sense at all.
As very few server administrators bother turning on features like MPTCP, QUIC has an advantage on mobile phones with moderate to bad reception. That's not a huge issue for me most of the time, but billions of people are using mobile phones as their only access to the internet, especially in developing countries that are practically skipping widespread copper and fiber infrastructure and moving directly to 5G instead. Any service those people are using should probably consider implementing QUIC, and if they use it, they'd benefit from an in-kernel server.
All the data center operators can stick to (MP)TCP, the telco people can stick to SCTP, but the consumer facing side of the internet would do well to keep QUIC as an option.
> That's not a huge issue for me most of the time, but billions of people are using mobile phones as their only access to the internet, especially in developing countries that are practically skipping widespread copper and fiber infrastructure and moving directly to 5G instead.
For what it's worth: Romania, one of the piss poorest countries of Europe, has a perfectly fine mobile phone network, and even outback small villages have XGPON fiber rollouts everywhere. Germany? As soon as you cross into the country from Austria, your phone signal instantly drops, barely any decent coverage outside of the cities. And forget about PON, much less GPON or even XGPON.
Germany should be considered a developing country when it comes to expectations around telecommunication.