I'm not really sure why the article mentions both Multipath TCP and network coding. They are very different techniques at different layers of the stack. Multipath TCP is a way of making what looks like a single TCP connection at the socket layer actually be transmitted over several TCP connections over the network, allowing transparent sharing of bandwidth between links and roaming or failover from one link to the ot…
> and frustratingly, it doesn't seem to actually link to the research that it mentions either, nor even provide enough a citation to find it Citations don't sell. Sex, violence, and realistic-sounding, baseless, faulty journalism does. Welcome to the 20xx's. :)
“Multipath” TCP Could Turbocharge Bandwidth
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Re: “Multipath” TCP Could Turbocharge Bandwidth
#22It would have been nice if the author would have included a reference to the actual open-source project that powers this, along with the authors http://multipath-tcp.org/mptcp_stats/authors.html
Re: “Multipath” TCP Could Turbocharge Bandwidth
#23It would have been nice if the author would have included a reference to the actual open-source project that powers this, along with the authors http://multipath-tcp.org/mptcp_stats/authors.html
Re: “Multipath” TCP Could Turbocharge Bandwidth
#24I've had this discussion about a dozen times now. MPTCP is a hack, plain and simple. It does not address the fundamental flaws of TCP, nor does it attempt to use something better suited for the job of, say, streaming media like SCTP. TCP is broken in today's age. It's still reliant on upstream single path routes that are mainly devised via BGP and OSPF. These two routing protocols are showing age and suck at multi pa…
Bloat is a very interesting conversation, most providers are not doing sufficient analysis of the interface buffer size in relation to latency. It would be very neat to see Juniper/Cisco building interface level auto-queue management to reduce the latency inducing over buffering that occurs on badly tweaked backbone links.
Re: “Multipath” TCP Could Turbocharge Bandwidth
#25Don't both endpoints have to support Multipath TCP? So I imagine we wouldn't see real gains for standard HTTP traffic in a good long while. Unless Apple passes the traffic through some intermediate proxy, of course...
Multipath TCP doesn't magically increase the amount of bandwidth either, it just allows a single TCP-like connection to use multiple internet connections. It would allow you to use all bandwidth available on multiple connections in a single TCP connection but right now we can already use all bandwidth available over multiple separate TCP connections.
Re: “Multipath” TCP Could Turbocharge Bandwidth
#26I've had this discussion about a dozen times now. MPTCP is a hack, plain and simple. It does not address the fundamental flaws of TCP, nor does it attempt to use something better suited for the job of, say, streaming media like SCTP. TCP is broken in today's age. It's still reliant on upstream single path routes that are mainly devised via BGP and OSPF. These two routing protocols are showing age and suck at multi pa…
Nitpicking: ISIS is /FAR/ more prevalent than OSPF in the really real world of ISPs. Both run Dijkstra at their core, but ISIS handles multipath much more cleanly. Bloat is a very interesting conversation, most providers are not doing sufficient analysis of the interface buffer size in relation to latency. It would be very neat to see Juniper/Cisco building interface level auto-queue management to reduce the latency…
Cisco and Juniper are dinosaurs, the real disruption is being done by those smaller orgs not focused on pushing overpriced big-iron.
edit: I am a network engineer by trade, and have worked in large ISPs over the years.
Re: “Multipath” TCP Could Turbocharge Bandwidth
#27I've had this discussion about a dozen times now. MPTCP is a hack, plain and simple. It does not address the fundamental flaws of TCP, nor does it attempt to use something better suited for the job of, say, streaming media like SCTP. TCP is broken in today's age. It's still reliant on upstream single path routes that are mainly devised via BGP and OSPF. These two routing protocols are showing age and suck at multi pa…
So, how long has SCTP been around? And how many consumers are actually able to use it? The problem is, IP and TCP and NAT and firewalls and BGP and OSPF are all fairly fundamental facts of the network we operate on. There's no way to unilaterally move to something else without, well, breaking the internet. IPv6 has been around for 17 years, and we're running out of IPv4 addresses at an alarming rate, yet IPv6 still h…
There are no bandwidth or reliability advantages of using multiple path IF you have constraints of network devices upstream. Why? Generally because upstream you're going to be traversing the same endpoint path as you converge. You may have disparate paths for a number of hops but generally your Internet connections on, say, mobile and cable will be geographically tied to the same region (let's say Chicago). There is no guarantee here for reliability (especially if both hosts are NOT multi-homed) - and if there is a problem the closer it is to the destination will exponentially increase the chance that the path for both ends up broken. Beyond that MPTCP doesn't "look" like regular TCP connections - they are regular TCP connections. The only magic is on the source. Where MPTCP solves problems is 1) in wireless handoff situations where the end user doesn't want to drop a session 2) avoiding setting things up like link aggregation in a DC environment (although this means multiple L3 paths must exist which is also additional infrastructure in most cases).
PMTUD was an analogy. It is something that's implemented everywhere and doesn't work. If organizations don't want MPTCP to work - they can very easily stop it through network controls. By default most session aware devices (firewalls, load balancers, etc) can break MPTCP by default since if they don't have the entire session they often will not allow the traffic.
The bases tenant of MPTCP breaks security models by splitting same session traffic over multiple TCP sessions. If part of a conversation goes through firewall A and the other goes through firewall B you lose context. If your firewall is L7 aware you will likely break the application tracking component. I am fully aware that each subflow is it's own session (in terms of setup/teardown) - however new security technologies will need to do extensive corroboration to fully understand flows across disparate parts of the network, and yes there is fallback for when things break.
I don't think MPTCP assumes anything. My point there was that if all the stars do not align you went through extra overhead to do nothing. Back to PMTUD - it's great when it works, but 99% of the time it doesn't.
Finally I realize that Apple has not created this. I've tested MPTCP in operational environments back in 2010 (and have been following it since 2009). The point is, I've seen it in operation and it's very niche focused on where it will showcase significant advantages. It is excellent work, I don't discount that. The reality is, however, that it's not what everyone is making it out to be. I've used it, I've implemented it, I've tested and researched it. Just because Apple is testing it - doesn't mean anything.
Ultimately I feel that closed minded statements around BGP and OSPF are half the misunderstanding of the fundamental problems. LISP is far more prevalent than you likely realize and nobody is boiling the ocean on that front and finally - IPv6 has far more than single-digit penetration. I'm pretty sure you pulled that one out of thin air. Over 40% of my home Internet traffic is IPv6 - just FYI.
Re: “Multipath” TCP Could Turbocharge Bandwidth
#28It would have been nice if the author would have included a reference to the actual open-source project that powers this, along with the authors http://multipath-tcp.org/mptcp_stats/authors.html
Re: “Multipath” TCP Could Turbocharge Bandwidth
#29Multiparty sounds great and all. But I'd be happy if they could make a laptop use both a hard-wired Ethernet and a wifi connection at the same time. Is it really that difficult? Not for bandwidth, I work with embedded systems. If the wifi is active, then it's not possible to connect to an IP address on the Ethernet port (OS X and Win7). Subnet doesn't matter, and re-arranging the priorities of the network devices doe…
You can "shotgun" connections but hardwired and wifi usually isn't a win since the wifi will be more error prone and higher latency than the wired. So if you have both you should probably just do the wired.
Re: “Multipath” TCP Could Turbocharge Bandwidth
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
Nitpicking: ISIS is /FAR/ more prevalent than OSPF in the really real world of ISPs. Both run Dijkstra at their core, but ISIS handles multipath much more cleanly. Bloat is a very interesting conversation, most providers are not doing sufficient analysis of the interface buffer size in relation to latency. It would be very neat to see Juniper/Cisco building interface level auto-queue management to reduce the latency…
Maybe in the EU - but ISIS fell off the bandwagon in the US years ago. I'd be curious to your claim, I've rarely run into ISIS in prod and I've had my hands on a lot of G2000 networks. Cisco and Juniper are dinosaurs, the real disruption is being done by those smaller orgs not focused on pushing overpriced big-iron. edit: I am a network engineer by trade, and have worked in large ISPs over the years.
I am the IGP principle at a Tier 1.