31 lines
2.1 KiB
HTML
31 lines
2.1 KiB
HTML
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<p>The ministreaming library is a layer on top of the core
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<a href="i2cp">I2CP</a> that allows reliable, in order, and authenticated streams
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of messages to operate across an unreliable, unordered, and unauthenticated
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message layer. Just like the TCP to IP relationship, this streaming
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functionality has a whole series of tradeoffs and optimizations available, but
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rather than embed that functionality into the base I2P code, it has been factored
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off into its own library both to keep the TCP-esque complexities seperate and to
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allow alternative optimized implemenations.</p>
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<p>The current ministreaming library was written by mihi as a part of his
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<a href="i2ptunnel">I2PTunnel</a> application and then factored out and released
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under the BSD license. It is called the "mini"streaming library because it makes
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some simplifications in the implementation, while a more robust streaming library
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could be further optimized for operation over I2P. The two main issues with
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the ministreaming library are its use of the traditional TCP two phase
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establishment protocol and the current fixed window size of 1. The establishment
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issue is minor for long lived streams, but for short ones, such as quick HTTP
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requests, the impact can be <a href="minwww">significant</a>. As for the window
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size, the ministreaming library doesn't maintain any ID or ordering within the
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messages sent (or include any application level ACK or SACK), so it must wait
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on average twice the time it takes to send a message before sending another.</p>
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<p>Even with those issues, the ministreaming library performs quite well in many
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situations, and its <a href="http://www.i2p.net/javadoc/net/i2p/client/streaming/package-summary.html">API</a>
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is both quite simple and capable of remaining unchanged as different streaming
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implementations are introduced. The library is deployed in its own
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ministreaming.jar, and it is located in CVS under
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<a href="http://dev.i2p.net/cgi-bin/cvsweb.cgi/i2p/apps/ministreaming/">
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i2p/apps/ministreaming/</a>. Developers in Java who would like to use it can
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access the API directly, while developers in other languages can use it through
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<a href="sam">SAM</a>'s streaming support.</p>
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