Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!WLV.IMSD.CONTEL.COM!sms
From: sms@WLV.IMSD.CONTEL.COM (Steven M. Schultz)
Newsgroups: comp.protocols.tcp-ip
Subject: Re: TCP Close re 2MSL
Message-ID: <9001152335.AA11290@WLV.IMSD.CONTEL.COM>
Date: 15 Jan 90 23:35:25 GMT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 21

zweig@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu (Johnny Zweig) writes:

>  <deleted> TIME-WAIT is
> a way of making it overwhelmingly likely that losing a single segment
> (that last ack) or spuriously retransmitting a single segment (the FIN)
> won't mess things up.
> 
> Keeping the connection descriptor around for 2 MSL is necessary so that
> I know what sequence numbers and whatnot to use  when I get a retransmission
> of a FIN I have ack'ed during that time.
 
	would it be a "good idea" to set the length of time a connection
	stays in the TIME_WAIT state to a (small) multiple of the smoothed
	round trip time accumulated during the connection's lifetime rather
	than a fixed (larger than necessary almost all of the time) constant?
	i find it hard to believe that the TIME_WAIT interval needs to be
	as large (default is 75 seconds i believe) on an ethernet as it
	does on a WAN from one coast to the other.

	Steven M. Schultz
	sms@wlv.imsd.contel.com