Re: Unbound DATA frames in HTTP/3 proposal

Hi Watson,

This is an HTTP/3 frame, not a QUIC frame. UNBOUND_DATA frames are
implemented at the same layer as DATA frames, which is in h3. All of this
goes inside QUIC streams but has no bearing on QUIC STREAM frames.

David

On Fri, Oct 3, 2025 at 2:15 PM Watson Ladd <watsonbladd@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Fri, Oct 3, 2025 at 1:46 PM Yaroslav Rosomakho
> <yrosomakho@zscaler.com> wrote:
> >
> > Dear HTTP Working Group,
> >
> > While HTTP/3 streams are very efficient for long-term connections such
> as CONNECT, WebSockets and WebTransport, the requirement to encapsulate
> everything into finite-length DATA frames reduces potential performance and
> flexibility. Best case scenario it introduces few extra unnecessary bytes
> on the wire, worst case scenario it can cause an extra memory copy.
> >
> > David and I would like to propose an optional extension, UNBOUND_DATA
> frame. This frame indicates that the remainder of the stream is data. This
> reduces framing overhead and simplifies transmission of long-lived or
> indeterminate-length payloads.
> >
> > Feedback and suggestions are very welcome.
>
> This sounds a lot more complicated than it might seem. In particular
> packets are made out of frames, and the frame header for STREAM
> determines which stream the rest of the bytes go on. I'm not sure from
> reading your draft what supporting this would look like.
>
> >
> > Best Regards,
> > Yaroslav
> >
> > ---------- Forwarded message ---------
> > A new version of Internet-Draft
> draft-rosomakho-httpbis-h3-unbound-data-00.txt
> > has been successfully submitted by Yaroslav Rosomakho and posted to the
> > IETF repository.
> >
> > Name:     draft-rosomakho-httpbis-h3-unbound-data
> > Revision: 00
> > Title:    Unbound DATA Frames in HTTP/3
> > Date:     2025-10-03
> > Group:    Individual Submission
> > Pages:    8
> > URL:
> https://www.ietf.org/archive/id/draft-rosomakho-httpbis-h3-unbound-data-00.txt
> > Status:
> https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-rosomakho-httpbis-h3-unbound-data/
> > HTML:
> https://www.ietf.org/archive/id/draft-rosomakho-httpbis-h3-unbound-data-00.html
> > HTMLized:
> https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/draft-rosomakho-httpbis-h3-unbound-data
> >
> >
> > Abstract:
> >
> >    This document defines a new HTTP/3 frame type, UNBOUND_DATA, and a
> >    corresponding SETTINGS parameter that enables endpoints to negotiate
> >    its use.  When an endpoint sends an UNBOUND_DATA frame on a request
> >    or response stream, it indicates that all subsequent octets on that
> >    stream are interpreted as data.  This applies both to message body
> >    data and to octets transmitted after CONNECT or extended CONNECT.
> >    The use of UNBOUND_DATA removes the need to encapsulate each portion
> >    of the data in DATA frames, reducing framing overhead and simplifying
> >    transmission of long-lived or indeterminate-length payloads.
> >
> >
> >
> > The IETF Secretariat
> >
> >
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>