Towards a Deeper Understanding of TCP BBR Congestion Control

Dominik Scholz, Benedikt Jaeger, Lukas Schwaighofer, Daniel Raumer, Fabien Geyer, Georg Carle

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contributionpeer-review

107 Scopus citations

Abstract

In 2016, Google published the bottleneck bandwidth and round-trip time (BBR) congestion control algorithm. Unlike established loss- or delay-based algorithms like CUBIC or Vegas, BBR claims to operate without creating packet loss or filling buffers. Because of these prospects and promising initial performance results, BBR has gained wide-spread attention. As such it has been subject to behavior and performance analysis, which confirmed the results, but also revealed critical flaws.Because BBR is still work in progress, measurement results have limited validity for the future. In this paper we present our publicly available framework for reproducible TCP measurements based on network emulation. In a case study, we analyze the TCP BBR algorithm, reproduce and confirm weaknesses of the current BBR implementation, and provide further insights. We also contribute an analysis of BBR's inter-flow synchronization behavior, showing that it reaches fairness equilibrium for long lived flows.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publication2018 IFIP Networking Conference IFIP Networking and Workshops, IFIP Networking 2018 - Proceedings
PublisherInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Inc.
Pages109-117
Number of pages9
ISBN (Electronic)9783903176089
DOIs
StatePublished - 2 Jul 2018
Event17th IFIP Networking Conference IFIP Networking and Workshops, IFIP Networking 2018 - Zurich, Switzerland
Duration: 14 May 201816 May 2018

Publication series

Name2018 IFIP Networking Conference IFIP Networking and Workshops, IFIP Networking 2018 - Proceedings

Conference

Conference17th IFIP Networking Conference IFIP Networking and Workshops, IFIP Networking 2018
Country/TerritorySwitzerland
CityZurich
Period14/05/1816/05/18

Keywords

  • BBR
  • Congestion Control
  • Reproducible Measurements
  • TCP

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