Lab Notes

Engineering notes from the Peters Lab studio. Updated occasionally.

Measuring TCP buffer limits on long-haul links

On a 165 ms path the default 4 MB send buffer caps a single flow at roughly 190 Mbps. Raising tcp_wmem to 32 MB, together with the global tcp_mem ceiling, lifted throughput to about 240 Mbps. Change one parameter at a time; measure after each.

Why small-file speed tests lie

A transfer that finishes before the congestion window opens never reaches steady state. Use a 100 MB object or larger when comparing high-latency links.

mosh over lossy routes

With 8 to 13 percent loss, interactive SSH stalls for seconds. mosh keeps typing responsive by predicting locally and syncing state over UDP.