Re:Delivering Billions of Messages Exactly Once
by jancsika on Thursday June 29, 2017 @04:37PM
(#14666663)
Question: what is the relationship (if any) between TCP and the Two Generals Problem?
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Re:Delivering Billions of Messages Exactly Once
by sillysaurus3 on Thursday June 29, 2017 @04:49PM
(#14666751)
The Two Generals Problem deals with communicating over an unreliable channel, as does TCP.
TCP solves the problem by retransmission, similar to approaches illustrated in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two_Generals%27_Problem#Engine...
Note that it's impossible to solve it completely, and TCP is no different. If you unplug your router, there is no hope of getting a message through. But it's highly unlikely that there is no path between you and your destination (a "partition") so TCP retransmits until it finds one. This would be similar to generals sending messengers until one gets through and a confirmation messenger comes back.