Exceeding connection limit

Dominik Schaefer schaedpq2 at gmx.de
Fri Dec 5 12:14:08 UTC 2008


Scott Bennett schrieb:
>      I still don't understand this.  I will try to find time to resume
> reading those proposals, but the idea of running stream data over a protocol
> with neither sequence preservation nor reliable delivery would be a good
> thing goes against all of my experience. For one thing, it would mean that
> those things would involve wheel-reinvention inside tor to support those
> characterstics of TCP not supported by UDP.
As far as I understand: Tor does not have to do any reliable delivery and
error correction at all, because that can all taken care of a level higher
(Tor being layer 3, the network layer and TCP layer 4, the transport layer).
Suppose an application communicates via TCP: then all error correction and
checking can be done by the TCP connection tunneled through Tor, not Tor
itself. If a packet is lost in Tor, it is no different to a packet-loss within
any other network. And in case of UDP through Tor it would be anyway someone
elses problem as well. Tor does not have to ensure a guarenteed and correct
delivery any more than other networks do.
Actually, it is a bad idea to tunnel TCP connections through TCP connections,
due to two interfering error corrections. Detailed explanation at: Why TCP
Over TCP Is A Bad Idea, http://sites.inka.de/sites/bigred/devel/tcp-tcp.html

Dominik



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