Subject: [Emailcore] Ticket #16: G.7.12. Review Timeout Specifications

From: Todd Herr <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 23 Feb 2021 15:10:20 -0500

Greetings.

Seeking to begin discussion of the subject ticket.

Alexey originally opened the ticket with the following text:

RFC 5321 <http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc5321> (and its predecessors going
back to 821) specify minimum periods for client and server to wait before
timing out. Are those intervals still appropriate in a world of faster
processors and faster networks? Should they be updated and revised? Or
should more qualifying language be added?

There is a comment already in the ticket attributed to Hector:

On a related note (maybe another issue?), only a few mailers sit after
an DATA transaction holding the socket until something else comes in
to start a new transaction. We had this discussion before, many years
ago, and I decided to knock them out with a shorter timeout
(PostDataTimeoutSecs?
<https://trac.ietf.org/trac/emailcore/wiki/PostDataTimeoutSecs>=35 secs)
after a DATA transaction because they
were taking up resources setting there doing nothing for an extended
time. In other words, we discussed the Timeout values and they are
fine, but I felt the 5 mins was too long after the DATA transaction
when certain mailers sit there and not send anything. I believe this
is a permission concept to allow a client to just hold a server
session, socket, process, resources, etc. When there are incoming
loads limits, it doesn't help to have one client to hold a line.

Section 4.5.3.2 in 5321 currently contains this text as introduction to the
sub-sections specifying each recommendation:

Based on extensive experience with busy mail-relay hosts, the minimum
per-command
timeout values SHOULD be as follows:

Hatless, I am in the camp that believes that it's certainly worth asking
those with current extensive experience with busy mail-relay hosts for
their input on the matter, and so I'll see if I can't get them to join in
the discussion.

-- 

*Todd Herr* | Sr. Technical Program Manager
*e:* [email-masked]
*p:*

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