Re: What's the issue with SCTP-based data channels on servers?

This is specifically about WebRTC Data Channels, so that would be
SCTP/DTLS/ICE (where ICE will most likely be UDP).

Cheers
Lennart

On 31.10.18 23:11, Cullen Jennings (fluffy) wrote:
> 
> Do you mean SCTP or SCTP over UDP ?
> 
> 
>> On Oct 23, 2018, at 11:05 AM, Lennart Grahl <lennart.grahl@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Hi everyone,
>>
>> we are repeatedly being told that *deploying* SCTP-based data channels
>> is too cumbersome. But I have yet to find out what's so cumbersome about it.
>>
>> There are libraries that terminate SCTP-based data channels (in fact,
>> I'm the maintainer of one particular implementation written in C called
>> RAWRTC). Even though I wouldn't exactly call my implementation very
>> mature, so far I have not heard of any deployment issues. The only thing
>> that could be slightly related is an issue with cross-compiling... but
>> that's pretty much it. Though, might be a popularity problem.
>>
>> I have overheard statements that usrsctp is immature. Please, if you
>> believe so, explain why. I give you that much: It uses an awkward API
>> since it moves the socket API into userspace. But that doesn't make it
>> immature. Furthermore, you don't need to use its API directly since data
>> channel implementations abstract it away.
>> I've also heard that usrsctp is hard to deploy: If so, I would like to
>> know that the issue is.
>>
>> There have been statements that there aren't any modern SCTP
>> implementations, that it is an old protocol and there generally is no
>> interest in it. That is not true, in fact there are people who have
>> written one just for the purpose of using it in WebRTC: aiortc (Python
>> 3), pions/webrtc (Go). I know of at least another person writing one in
>> Rust and Tim has written one in Java.
>>
>> So, to come back to my original question: What are the actual
>> *deployment* problems people face? If there is no deployment issue, what
>> is it that drives you away from SCTP-based data channels?
>>
>> If you do have contacts that might be able to provide feedback, please
>> forward them this mail.
>>
>> Cheers
>> Lennart
>>
>

Received on Thursday, 1 November 2018 13:53:50 UTC