Motivation:
Our http2 child channel implementation was not 100 % complete and had a few bugs. Beside this the performance overhead was non-trivial.
Modifications:
There are a lot of modifications, the most important....
* Http2FrameCodec extends Http2ConnectionHandler and Http2MultiplexCodec extends Http2FrameCodec to reduce performance heads and inter-dependencies on handlers in the pipeline
* Correctly handle outbound flow control for child channels
* Support unknow frame types in Http2FrameCodec and Http2MultiplexCodec
* Use a consistent way how to create Http2ConnectionHandler, Http2FrameCodec and Http2MultiplexCodec (via a builder)
* Remove Http2Codec and Http2CodecBuilder as the user should just use Http2MultipleCodec and Http2MultiplexCodecBuilder now
* Smart handling of flushes from child channels to reduce overhead
* Reduce object allocations
* child channels always use the same EventLoop as the parent Channel to reduce overhead and simplify implementation.
* Not extend AbstractChannel for the child channel implementation to reduce overhead in terms of performance and memory usage
* Remove Http2FrameStream.managedState(...) as the user of the child channel api should just use Channel.attr(...)
Result:
Http2MultiplexCodec (and so child channels) and Http2FrameCodec are more correct, faster and more feature complete.
Motivation:
This PR (unfortunately) does 4 things:
1) Add outbound flow control to the Http2MultiplexCodec:
The HTTP/2 child channel API should interact with HTTP/2 outbound/remote flow control. That is,
if a H2 stream used up all its flow control window, the corresponding child channel should be
marked unwritable and a writability-changed event should be fired. Similarly, a unwritable
child channel should be marked writable and a writability-event should be fired, once a
WINDOW_UPDATE frame has been received. The changes are (mostly) contained in ChannelOutboundBuffer,
AbstractHttp2StreamChannel and Http2MultiplexCodec.
2) Introduce a Http2Stream2 object, that is used instead of stream identifiers on stream frames. A
Http2Stream2 object allows an application to attach state to it, and so a application handler
no longer needs to maintain stream state (i.e. in a map(id -> state)) himself.
3) Remove stream state events, which are no longer necessary due to the introduction of Http2Stream2.
Also those stream state events have been found hard and complex to work with, when porting gRPC
to the Http2FrameCodec.
4) Add support for HTTP/2 frames that have not yet been implemented, like PING and SETTINGS. Also add
a Http2FrameCodecBuilder that exposes options from the Http2ConnectionHandler API that couldn't else
be used with the frame codec, like buffering outbound streams, window update ratio, frame logger, etc.
Modifications:
1) A child channel's writability and a H2 stream's outbound flow control window interact, as described
in the motivation. A channel handler is free to ignore the channel's writability, in which case the
parent channel is reponsible for buffering writes until a WINDOW_UPDATE is received.
The connection-level flow control window is ignored for now. That is, a child channel's writability
is only affected by the stream-level flow control window. So a child channel could be marked writable,
even though the connection-level flow control window is zero.
2) Modify Http2StreamFrame and the Http2FrameCodec to take a Http2Stream2 object intstead of a primitive
integer. Introduce a special Http2ChannelDuplexHandler that has newStream() and forEachActiveStream()
methods. It's recommended for a user to extend from this handler, to use those advanced features.
3) As explained in the documentation, a new inbound stream active can be detected by checking if the
Http2Stream2.managedState() of a Http2HeadersFrame is null. An outbound stream active can be detected
by adding a listener to the ChannelPromise of the write of the first Http2HeadersFrame. A stream
closed event can be listened to by adding a listener to the Http2Stream2.closeFuture().
4) Add a simple Http2FrameCodecBuilder and implement the missing frame types.
Result:
1) The Http2MultiplexCodec supports outbound flow control.
2) The Http2FrameCodec API makes it easy for a user to manage custom stream specific state and to create
new outbound streams.
3) The Http2FrameCodec API is much cleaner and easier to work with. Hacks like the ChannelCarryingHeadersFrame
are no longer necessary.
4) The Http2FrameCodec now also supports PING and SETTINGS frames. The Http2FrameCodecBuilder allows the Http2FrameCodec
to use some of the rich features of the Http2ConnectionHandler API.
Motivation:
The HTTP/2 child channel API does not allow to create local/outbound HTTP/2 streams.
Modifications:
Add a Http2StreamChannelBootstrap that allows to create outbound streams.
Result:
The HTTP/2 child channel API now supports outbound streams.
Motivation:
Quote from issue 4914:
"Http2MultiplexCodec currently does two things: mapping the existing h2 API to frames and managing the child channels.
It would be better if the two parts were separated. This would allow less-coupled development of the HTTP/2 handlers (flow control could be its own handler, for instance) and allow applications to insert themselves between all streams and the codec, which permits custom logic and could be used, in part, to implement custom frame types.
It would also greatly ease testing, as the child channel could be tested by itself without dealing with how frames are encoded on the wire."
Modifications:
- Split the Http2MultiplexCodec into Http2FrameCodec and Http2MultiplexCodec. The Http2FrameCodec interacts with the existing HTTP/2 callback-based API, while the Http2MulitplexCodec is completely independent of it and simply multiplexes Http2StreamFrames to the child channels. Additionally, the Http2Codec handler is introduced, which is a convenience class that simply sets up the Http2FrameCodec and Http2MultiplexCodec in the channel pipeline and removes itself.
- Improved test coverage quite a bit.
Result:
- The original Http2MultiplexCodec is split into Http2FrameCodec and Http2MultiplexCodec.
- More tests for higher confidence in the code.
Motivation:
The HTTP/2 specification requires the pad length field of DATA, HEADERS and PUSH_PROMISE frames to be counted towards the flow control window. The current implementation doesn't do so (See #5434).
Furthermore, it's currently not possible to add one byte padding, as this would add the one byte pad length field as well as append one padding byte to the end of the frame.
Modifications:
Include the one byte pad length field in the padding parameter of the API. Thereby extending the allowed value range by one byte to 256 (inclusive). On the wire, a one byte padding is encoded with a pad length field with value zero and a 256 byte padding is encoded with a pad length field with value 255 and 255 bytes append to the end of the frame.
Result:
More correct padding.
Motivation:
Some codecs should be considered unstable as these are relative new. For this purpose we should introduce an annotation which these codecs should us to be marked as unstable in terms of API.
Modifications:
- Add UnstableApi annotation and use it on codecs that are not stable
- Move http2.hpack to http2.internal.hpack as it is internal.
Result:
Better document unstable APIs.
Motivation:
This allows using handlers for Streams in normal Netty-style. Frames are
read/written to the channel as messages, not directly as a
callback/method call. Handlers allow mixing and can ease HTTP/1 and
HTTP/2 interoperability by eventually supporting HTTP/1 handlers in
HTTP/2 and vise versa.
Modifications:
New handler Http2MultiplexCodec that converts from the current HTTP/2
API to a message-based API and child channels for streams.
Result:
The basics are done for server-side: new streams trigger creation of new
channels in much the same appearance to how new connections trigger new
channel creation. The basic frames HEADERS and DATA are handled, but
also GOAWAY and RST_STREAM.
Inbound flow control is implemented, but outbound is not. That will be
done later, along with not completing write promises on the child
channel until the write actually completes on the parent.
There is not yet support for outbound priority/weight, push promises,
and many other features.
There is a generic Object that may be set on stream frames. This also
paves the way for client-side support which needs a way to refer to
yet-to-be-created streams (due to how HEADERS allocates a stream id, and
the allocation order must be the same as transmission order).
