Re: [tor-bugs] #21206 [Core Tor/Tor]: Measure client up/down bandwidth for directory requests, split by type

["Tor Bug Tracker & Wiki" <blackhole@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

#21206: Measure client up/down bandwidth for directory requests, split by type
--------------------------+------------------------------------
 Reporter:  nickm         |          Owner:  ahf
     Type:  defect        |         Status:  assigned
 Priority:  Medium        |      Milestone:  Tor: 0.3.1.x-final
Component:  Core Tor/Tor  |        Version:
 Severity:  Normal        |     Resolution:
 Keywords:  sponsor4      |  Actual Points:
Parent ID:  #21205        |         Points:  3
 Reviewer:                |        Sponsor:
--------------------------+------------------------------------

Comment (by nickm):

 Replying to [comment:2 ahf]:
 > > We need a way to measure, over time, split up by type of directory
 > > request, how much bandwidth a client uses for requests and for
 > > responses.
 >
 > Right now my approach is to catch the size of the `inbuf` in
 > `connection_dir_client_reached_eof` and log a message with the status
 > code and the purpose of the request (`DIR_PURPOSE_*`).

 This is a plausible place to look at the response size.  It doesn't,
 however, cover request size -- some requests are significant in length.

 I think all of the requests should go out through directory_send_command,
 so that would be the place to instrument for those.

 > > We should include both directory lookups that are successful and those
 > > that are not.
 >
 > For the case where we interact with a directory and the status-code is
 > erroneous we log that using the above approach. For the case where we
 > are simply unable to reach a given directory, we should log an error
 > reason as well as how much data that have been fetched before the error
 > was encountered. This should be possible in
 > `connection_dir_request_failed`.
 >
 > > We should, if possible, measure this with and without circuit
 > > overhead. But not if it's too hard.
 > >
 > > We should, if possible, count failed circuits that are opened only for
 > > directory requests. But not if it's too hard.
 >
 > I haven't looked into the circuit/channel code yet. I'll do that once
 > the two first bullets are solved, but hopefully this shouldn't be too
 > difficult.

 I hope so too.  The kinds of overhead here are:
   * TLS record headers
   * Cells used to create and tear down circuits and streams
   * Circuit headers and relay cell headers.
   * Padding bytes in relay data cells that aren't full.

 For some of those it might be "good enough" to estimate the overhead.

 > How should we go on about this measuring code in general:
 >
 > - I don't think the log message approach is suitable to enter the
 codebase.

 Doing that at level "info" or "debug" it would be okay for debugging
 purposes, but it doesn't seem to me this is the best approach for us to
 actually use for statistics reporting.

 > - Elsewhere in the code we do collect metrics and save them to a set of
 >   "stats" files. Should we use the same approach for this measurement
 such that
 >   it can be reused at a later point in time, where someone might, say,
 >   look into using an entirely different compression algorithm than what
 >   is provided by zlib or a likewise task that requires knowledge of the
 >   currently used bandwidth used by directory requests/responses.

 Currently, I think we (mostly?) use that pattern only when the statistics
 are ones that we're recording persistently across runs, and we want to
 include them in router descriptors.  I wouldn't mind extending it, if it
 makes sense in this case though.

 > - One of the requests I have for my "onboarding period" is to get a lot
 >   of feedback on timeframes: I currently have tor running locally that
 >   emits information on failed directory requests as well as bytes read
 >   and written for a request. If we go for using an additional stats-file
 >   I should be able to have some code working at noon Monday that could
 >   be reviewed. Once that code is in I'll continue with support for
 >   measurements that includes the overhead of the circuit connection.
 >
 sounds good!

--
Ticket URL: <https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/21206#comment:3>
Tor Bug Tracker & Wiki <https://trac.torproject.org/>
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