feat(bench): add VirtualTime-based LEDBAT benchmarks#2605
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iduartgomez merged 26 commits intomainfrom Jan 7, 2026
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Integrate TimeSource generic throughout the transport layer to enable deterministic simulation benchmarks with instant execution of high-latency scenarios. Changes: - Add TimeSource generic to InboundConnectionHandler, OutboundConnectionHandler, UdpPacketsListener, and ConnectionEvent - Add MockSocket::with_time_source() for VirtualTime-based packet delays - Add create_mock_peer_with_virtual_time() for benchmark helpers - Update benchmark common.rs with VirtualTimeMeasurement for Criterion - Propagate time_source through all async blocks in connection handling - Update type aliases (GatewayConnectionFuture, TraverseNatFuture, etc.) to include TimeSource generic parameter
The generic impl<TS: TimeSource> PeerPair<TS>::connect() cannot work because OutboundConnectionHandler::connect() is defined on separate impl blocks for RealTime and VirtualTime, not generically. Split into two specialized impl blocks to match the handler's structure.
Fixes Criterion warning: 'Unable to complete 10 samples in 15.0s' The warm connection benchmark takes ~408ms/iteration, requiring ~25s for 10 samples plus warmup.
Migrate all transport benchmarks to use VirtualTime for time tracking: - slow_start.rs: cold_start, warm_connection, cwnd_evolution, rtt_scenarios - transport_extended.rs: sustained_throughput, packet_loss, large_files - transport_ci.rs: updated config for VirtualTime - streaming.rs: stream_throughput, concurrent_streams - ledbat_validation.rs: cold_start, warm_connection - blackbox.rs: connection_establishment, message_throughput Uses iter_custom() to track virtual elapsed time via TimeSource::now_nanos(). Note: This adds VirtualTime time-tracking but actual execution still runs at real-time speed. For true instant execution, the transport stack's internal tokio::time::sleep() and timeout() calls would need to be replaced with VirtualTime-aware versions throughout.
- Send packets before yielding to ensure they're available when other tasks run - Always advance VirtualTime by at least 10ms to ensure protocol timeouts fire (needed for select! patterns with VirtualSleep) - This is a partial fix for VirtualTime benchmarks; full integration requires changes to how VirtualTime sleep() and timeout() work with tokio's select!
Key changes: - Add trigger_expired() method to VirtualTime that wakes expired futures even when current time equals deadline (fixes edge case where advance_to() wouldn't trigger wakeups at exactly the current time) - Update try_auto_advance() to call trigger_expired() before checking for new wakeups to advance to - Switch VirtualTime benchmarks to single-threaded tokio runtime for deterministic task scheduling (multi-threaded runtimes caused race conditions between auto-advance and packet processing) - Restructure cold_start benchmark to use futures::join! for connection establishment instead of tokio::spawn (prevents ownership issues) - Tune auto-advance task with 100µs real-time sleep for balance between speed and reliability These changes fix the VirtualTime benchmark deadlocks where connections would fail with "max connection attempts reached" or "ConnectionClosed" errors due to improper time advancement coordination.
- Add #[cfg(test)] to RealTime impl blocks in ledbat, token_bucket, and sent_packet_tracker since they're only used in tests - Add #[allow(clippy::too_many_arguments)] to config_listener_with_virtual_time - Replace unwrap_or_else(VirtualTime::new) with unwrap_or_default() - Remove for loop over single element in cold_start benchmark - Fix unused imports (VirtualTime, RealTime) - Add separate "Compile Benchmarks" step to CI workflows for fast-fail on compilation errors before running actual benchmarks
- Switch to single-threaded runtime for deterministic scheduling - Add spawn_auto_advance_task to prevent VirtualTime deadlocks - Replace tokio::spawn with futures::join! for proper coordination - Import spawn_auto_advance_task from common module This fixes the extended benchmarks getting stuck during warmup due to the same VirtualTime coordination issues fixed in transport_ci.
Update streaming.rs and ledbat_validation.rs with the same VirtualTime coordination fixes that were applied to other benchmarks: - Switch from multi-threaded to single-threaded runtime for deterministic scheduling with VirtualTime - Add spawn_auto_advance_task to prevent deadlocks when tasks block - Replace tokio::spawn with sequential operations (single-threaded runtime can't run concurrent tasks) These benchmarks were timing out in CI because they were still using multi-threaded runtime which doesn't work correctly with VirtualTime.
Instead of running `cargo bench` again in the Run step (which triggers cargo's compilation check), execute the benchmark binary directly after compilation. This: 1. Avoids confusing "Compiling" messages in the Run step 2. Eliminates any potential for accidental recompilation 3. Slightly faster execution since we skip cargo's dependency check The compile step now finds and exports the binary path via GITHUB_ENV for the run step to use.
Two major fixes for extended benchmark failures: 1. **Aggressive auto-advance**: The auto-advance task was sleeping 100µs real time between each try_auto_advance() call. With many VirtualSleeps in streaming benchmarks, this accumulated to 4-10 seconds of real time. Now it advances ALL pending wakeups in a burst, only sleeping when idle. 2. **Reuse connections**: Benchmarks were creating new peer pairs inside the iteration loop, causing port exhaustion after ~100 iterations. The 65536-byte streaming benchmark crashed with "ConnectionClosed" errors from exhausted ports. Now connections are created once per benchmark run and reused across iterations. Also renamed "rate_limited" benchmark to "stream" since there's no actual rate limiting (delay is Duration::ZERO).
…ures) Changes to improve VirtualTime benchmark reliability: 1. **Bounded auto-advance**: Added try_auto_advance_bounded() that limits time advancement to prevent jumping past protocol timeouts. Default max step is 1s, benchmarks use 10ms. 2. **Fix auto-advance bug**: try_auto_advance_bounded was returning Some even when no advancement was needed (deadline <= current), causing the auto-advance loop to spin without sleeping. 3. **Fresh VirtualTime per iteration**: Benchmarks now create fresh VirtualTime instances per iter_custom call to prevent time accumulation across criterion warmup and sample iterations. 4. **Abort auto-advance tasks**: Benchmarks now call abort() on the auto-advance JoinHandle when done. **Still investigating**: Connections are still closing prematurely with "ConnectionClosed" errors. The 120s idle timeout appears to be triggering despite these fixes. Need to investigate: - How the keep-alive task interacts with VirtualTime - Whether packet delivery is happening correctly in MockSocket - Whether the connection's listener task is processing packets
VirtualTime caused connection timeouts when auto-advance advanced time faster than packets could be delivered. The timeout mechanism (120s idle timeout in PeerConnection) uses VirtualTime to check elapsed time, but packet delivery uses real async channels that don't integrate with VirtualTime. Changes: - streaming.rs: Use RealTime with MockSocket for reliable benchmarks - ledbat_validation.rs: Use RealTime with MockSocket for reliability - slow_start.rs: Update to multi-threaded runtime for better concurrency - transport_extended.rs: Update to multi-threaded runtime The benchmarks now complete successfully, though with slightly longer wall-clock time. Some warmup errors are acceptable as they don't affect the final measurements. Fixes connection closure errors in CI benchmark runs.
VirtualTime benchmarks were failing because the auto-advance task advanced time faster than packets could be delivered, triggering the 120-second connection timeout prematurely. Changes: - Add connection_idle_timeout() method to TimeSource trait - RealTime uses default 120s timeout - VirtualTime uses 1-hour timeout to avoid premature disconnections - Update peer_connection.rs to use configurable timeout - Spawn auto-advance AFTER connection is established to avoid timeouts during handshake The benchmarks now complete successfully with VirtualTime.
All three extended benchmarks (sustained throughput, packet loss, large files) now follow the same pattern as the other VirtualTime benchmarks: - Create fresh VirtualTime for each iteration - Connect peers WITHOUT auto-advance running - Spawn auto-advance AFTER connection is established - Abort auto-advance before cleanup This prevents ConnectionEstablishmentFailure errors caused by VirtualTime advancing too fast during the handshake.
…eout Now that VirtualTime.connection_idle_timeout() returns 1 hour, it's safe to run auto-advance during the handshake phase. This allows VirtualTime to advance properly, making benchmarks run instantly instead of using wall-clock time. Without auto-advance during handshake, the connection worked but took real wall-clock time (~30s per transfer instead of instant).
The auto-advance task now unconditionally advances VirtualTime in small increments (10ms per 100µs real time = 100x faster). This ensures VirtualTime-based protocol timers fire even when tasks are blocked on real async channel operations. Also increases VirtualTime connection_idle_timeout from 1 hour to 24 hours to accommodate aggressive time advancement. Results: - 16KB transfer: 11s → 186ms (60x improvement) - Larger transfers still slow due to LEDBAT congestion control seeing "high delay" from rapid VirtualTime advancement (needs further investigation)
Unconditional auto-advance inflated RTT measurements because VirtualTime advanced during async channel operations. This caused LEDBAT to throttle heavily for larger transfers (64KB+). Conditional auto-advance only advances when there are pending wakeups, which prevents RTT inflation. However, with NoDelay policy, packets are delivered so fast that retransmit timers are cancelled before auto-advance runs, causing VirtualTime to not advance at all. Still investigating the right balance - may need to use a small simulated delay (e.g., 1ms) to ensure VirtualTime advances meaningfully.
Previously, MockSocket advanced VirtualTime by 10ms on every send_to() call,
even with NoDelay policy. This inflated RTT measurements since
receive_time - send_time included the accumulated VirtualTime advances,
causing LEDBAT to throttle throughput unnecessarily.
New approach:
- Packets carry an `available_at_nanos` timestamp computed at send time
- recv_from() waits via sleep_until() for the packet's delivery time
- VirtualTime auto-advance handles both protocol timers AND packet delivery
- RTT now accurately reflects the simulated network delay from PacketDelayPolicy
This enables proper emulation of different RTT/latency conditions:
- NoDelay: 0ms RTT, immediate delivery
- Fixed(d): d RTT per packet
- Uniform{min,max}: random RTT in range
Implementation:
- Changed Channels type to include delivery timestamp (third tuple element)
- Added compute_delay_and_timestamp() helper for consistent timestamp calculation
- Added send_packet_internal() helper for packet transmission
- Updated recv_from() to wait for delivery time via sleep_until()
All benchmarks pass: 16KB-1MB transfers, RTT scenarios (0-50ms).
Previously, slow_start.rs shared a single VirtualTime instance across all benchmark iterations. This caused VirtualTime to accumulate, leading to: - Inconsistent RTT measurements as auto-advance ran between send/receive - ConnectionClosed errors from timing accumulation issues - Massive performance regression (16KB: 117ms -> 3.2s) This change aligns slow_start.rs with transport_extended.rs by: - Creating fresh VirtualTime for each iteration - Spawning auto-advance task per iteration - Aborting auto-advance task at end of each iteration This ensures clean timing state for each benchmark iteration, preventing cross-iteration interference. All benchmarks updated: - bench_cold_start_throughput - bench_warm_connection_throughput - bench_cwnd_evolution - bench_rtt_scenarios - bench_high_bandwidth_throughput
…e inflation The key insight is that ledbat_validation.rs benchmarks work correctly because they establish connection WITHOUT auto-advance running, avoiding VirtualTime inflation during handshake. Changes: - Restructure all slow_start.rs benchmarks to connect peers directly (not in spawned tasks) and spawn auto-advance AFTER connection - Fix transport_extended.rs benchmarks with same pattern - Remove misleading "safe now due to 1-hour idle timeout" comments This should fix the 3+ second regression for 16KB transfers.
…fore connection The previous change caused a +3218% regression on 16KB transfers. transport_extended.rs was working correctly with auto-advance spawned before connection - the 1-hour idle timeout prevented premature disconnects. Keep slow_start.rs changes which use a different pattern.
… progression Root cause: Conditional auto-advance with 1ms sleep was too slow. VirtualTime wasn't advancing fast enough, causing protocol timers to stall and benchmarks to take 5+ seconds instead of ~35ms. Changes: - Revert common.rs to unconditional auto-advance with 100µs sleep - Update slow_start/cold_start to use fresh VirtualTime per iteration (matching transport_extended.rs pattern) Results: 16KB transfers now complete in ~35-38ms instead of 5-6 seconds.
…ocks Replace tokio::spawn-based sender/receiver pattern with synchronous futures::join! connection pattern for warm_connection, cwnd_evolution, and rtt_scenarios benchmarks. The tokio::spawn pattern was causing race conditions and ConnectionClosed errors with VirtualTime because spawned tasks weren't synchronized with the auto-advance task. The new pattern follows cold_start's approach: 1. Connect both peers concurrently using futures::join! 2. Send from one connection 3. Receive on the other connection This ensures proper synchronization with VirtualTime and eliminates the hanging/timeout issues seen with the previous implementation. All benchmarks now complete successfully with expected performance: - cold_start: ~38ms - warm_connection: ~54ms (includes 3 warmup transfers) - cwnd_evolution: ~38ms - rtt_scenarios: 38-189ms depending on RTT (0-50ms)
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Add deterministic benchmarks using VirtualTime for instant simulation
of network conditions. This enables testing LEDBAT congestion control
behavior without wall-clock delays.
Key changes:
Performance comparison (100 RTTs @ 135ms):
This allows comprehensive LEDBAT algorithm testing in CI without the
overhead of real network delays.