netdev - Re: [PATCH net 1/1] tipc: resolve connection flow control compatibility problem

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Date:   Fri, 25 Nov 2016 21:38:49 -0500 (EST)
From:   David Miller <davem@...emloft.net>
To:     jon.maloy@...csson.com
Cc:     netdev@...r.kernel.org, parthasarathy.bhuvaragan@...csson.com,
        ying.xue@...driver.com, maloy@...jonn.com,
        tipc-discussion@...ts.sourceforge.net
Subject: Re: [PATCH net 1/1] tipc: resolve connection flow control
 compatibility problem

From: Jon Maloy <jon.maloy@...csson.com>
Date: Thu, 24 Nov 2016 18:47:07 -0500

> In commit 10724cc7bb78 ("tipc: redesign connection-level flow control")
> we replaced the previous message based flow control with one based on
> 1k blocks. In order to ensure backwards compatibility the mechanism
> falls back to using message as base unit when it senses that the peer
> doesn't support the new algorithm. The default flow control window,
> i.e., how many units can be sent before the sender blocks and waits
> for an acknowledge (aka advertisement) is 512. This was tested against
> the previous version, which uses an acknowledge frequency of on ack per
> 256 received message, and found to work fine.
> 
> However, we missed the fact that versions older than Linux 3.15 use an
> acknowledge frequency of 512, which is exactly the limit where a 4.6+
> sender will stop and wait for acknowledge. This would also work fine if
> it weren't for the fact that if the first sent message on a 4.6+ server
> side is an empty SYNACK, this one is also is counted as a sent message,
> while it is not counted as a received message on a legacy 3.15-receiver.
> This leads to the sender always being one step ahead of the receiver, a
> scenario causing the sender to block after 512 sent messages, while the
> receiver only has registered 511 read messages. Hence, the legacy
> receiver is not trigged to send an acknowledge, with a permanently
> blocked sender as result.
> 
> We solve this deadlock by simply allowing the sender to send one more
> message before it blocks, i.e., by a making minimal change to the
> condition used for determining connection congestion.
> 
> Signed-off-by: Jon Maloy <jon.maloy@...csson.com>

Applied, thanks Jon.