van@LBL-CSAM.ARPA (Van Jacobson) (06/18/87)
A port of the 4.3bsd tcp code to Sun OS v3.3 is available for anonymous ftp from host lbl-rtsg.arpa as compressed tar file 4.3tcp4sun.tar.Z (~ 50KB). This code reflects what Berkeley is presently running (as of June 6th) and includes all the bug fixes and performance enhancements made since the 4.3bsd release. In limitted testing we have found that the 4.3 code improves local net performance by about a factor of two over the code that came with Sun v3.3. E.g., throughput on an ftp between two Sun 3/50s went from 100KByte/sec to 190KByte/sec. Most of the post-distribution changes in 4.3 have had to do with performance over congested links (like the Arpanet). We expected, and observed, a large performance improvement over the Sun (nee 4.2bsd) code. Unfortunately we couldn't quantify the change: In six file transfer trials over the Arpanet at midday, the 4.3 code delivered an average of 1.2KB/sec. The original Sun code timed out without completing a transfer on all six trials. Thus, we are postulating an infinite improvement. The tarchive contains objects for a 68020. Since the tcp code is Berkeley's and not in any way derived from Sun's code, all the source is included. Note that this is only the 4.3 tcp and doesn't include the 4.3 fixes made to ip, icmp or udp (this 4.3 tcp does not depend on any of these fixes and will run in a Sun v3.3 system as-is). - Van
nowicki@SUN.COM (Bill Nowicki) (06/23/87)
One clarification: the current release of Sun's Operating System, 3.4,
already has TCP code that is based on the 4.3BSD release. Many people
might want to just get the latest supported release instead of rolling
their own. SunOS 3.4 also includes ICMP enhancements from 4.3BSD.
On the other hand, Van has done some very good work on the analysis and
tuning of TCP. At last, some real measured improvements! Thanks.
Bill Nowicki
Sun Micairciscoc.