RFC 7141 · BEST CURRENT PRACTICE · 2014

Byte and Packet Congestion Notification

Overview

RFC 7141, “Byte and Packet Congestion Notification”, is a Best Current Practice document published in February 2014 by B. Briscoe, J. Manner. It updates RFC 2309, RFC 2914. The canonical text is published by the RFC Editor.

Abstract

This document provides recommendations of best current practice for dropping or marking packets using any active queue management (AQM) algorithm, including Random Early Detection (RED), BLUE, Pre- Congestion Notification (PCN), and newer schemes such as CoDel (Controlled Delay) and PIE (Proportional Integral controller Enhanced). We give three strong recommendations: (1) packet size should be taken into account when transports detect and respond to congestion indications, (2) packet size should not be taken into account when network equipment creates congestion signals (marking, dropping), and therefore (3) in the specific case of RED, the byte- mode packet drop variant that drops fewer small packets should not be used. This memo updates RFC 2309 to deprecate deliberate preferential treatment of small packets in AQM algorithms.

Abstract as published in the RFC, via rfc-editor.org.

What “Best Current Practice” means

Documents the IETF community's recommended operational or procedural practice rather than a protocol specification.

Read this RFC

The canonical text of RFC 7141 is hosted at rfc-editor.org. Available in TXT,HTML.

Relationships to other RFCs
This RFC updates
RFC 2309 RFC 2914
Other RFCs from 2014

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