lhotari commented on code in PR #23398:
URL: https://github.com/apache/pulsar/pull/23398#discussion_r1848605217


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+# PIP-385: Add rate limit semantics to pulsar protocol and Java client
+
+<details>
+  <summary><h2>Table of Contents</h2></summary>
+
+- [Background knowledge](#background-knowledge)
+  * [Challenges with the current 
approach](#challenges-with-the-current-approach)
+- [Motivation](#motivation)
+- [Goals](#goals)
+  * [In Scope](#in-scope)
+  * [Out of Scope](#out-of-scope)
+- [High Level Design](#high-level-design)
+  * [New binary protocol commands](#new-binary-protocol-commands)
+  * [Java client changes](#java-client-changes)
+- [Detailed Design](#detailed-design)
+  * [High-level Implementation Details](#high-level-implementation-details)
+    + [Broker Changes](#broker-changes)
+    + [Determining the throttling duration for 
clients](#determining-the-throttling-duration-for-clients)
+    + [Java Client Changes](#java-client-changes-1)
+    + [Blocking messages to be sent during 
throttling](#blocking-messages-to-be-sent-during-throttling)
+    + [Client side rate limit exception](#client-side-rate-limit-exception)
+  * [Public-facing Changes](#public-facing-changes)
+    + [Binary Protocol](#binary-protocol)
+    + [Java Client](#java-client)
+    + [Configuration](#configuration)
+    + [Metrics](#metrics)
+- [Backward & Forward Compatibility](#backward-forward-compatibility)
+  * [Upgrade / Downgrade / Rollback](#upgrade-downgrade-rollback)
+  * [Lower Protocol Client](#lower-protocol-client)
+  * [Lower Protocol Server](#lower-protocol-server)
+- [Alternatives](#alternatives)
+- [Links](#links)
+
+</details>
+
+# Background knowledge
+
+Being a multi tenant system, pulsar supports quality of service constructs 
like topic quotas in bytes per second and
+qps. On top of this, the fact that one broker has only certain limited 
resources, it has to additionally implement some
+other controls to limit the resources usage, like how much message buffer it 
has, etc.
+
+As such, pulsar induces throttling at multiple levels. Just looking at publish 
level throttling, here are the various
+levers that we can configure in pulsar which enables us to rate limit a 
producer, topic or an entire connection from a
+client:
+
+* At the core of it, we can set topic level publish rate in bytes and/or 
messages per second.
+* We can create a resource group (combination of one or more namespaces or 
tenants) and set a publish-rate for that
+  resource group.
+* We can set a broker config to throttle based on pending messages at a 
connection level.
+  See 
[maxPendingPublishRequestsPerConnection](https://github.com/apache/pulsar/blob/4b3b273c1c57741f9f9da2118eb4ec5dfeee2220/pulsar-broker-common/src/main/java/org/apache/pulsar/broker/ServiceConfiguration.java#L750)
+* We can set a broker config to throttle based on message buffer size at a 
thread level.
+  See 
[maxMessagePublishBufferSizeInMB](https://github.com/apache/pulsar/blob/4b3b273c1c57741f9f9da2118eb4ec5dfeee2220/pulsar-broker-common/src/main/java/org/apache/pulsar/broker/ServiceConfiguration.java#L1431C17-L1431C49)
+* We can set a broker level maximum publish rate per broker in bytes and/or 
messages.
+
+Currently, the way pulsar uses these levers and enforces these limits is by 
pausing reading further messages from an
+established connection for a topic. This is transparent to the clients, and 
they continue to publish further messages
+with an increased observed latency. Once the publish-rates are within the 
limits, broker resumes reading from the
+connection.
+
+Here is a small illustration to demonstrate the situation:
+
+```mermaid
+%%{init: {"mirrorActors": false, "rightAngles": false} }%%
+sequenceDiagram
+    Client->>Server: CreateProducer(reqId, myTopic)
+    Note right of Server: Check Authorization
+    Server-->>Client: ProducerSuccess(reqId, producerName)
+    Activate Client
+    Activate Server
+    Client->>Server: Send(1, message1)
+    Client->>Server: Send(2, message2)
+    Server-->>Client: SendReceipt(1, msgId1)
+    Client->>Server: Send(3, message3)
+    Client->>Server: Send(4, message4)
+    Note right of Server: Topic breaching quota
+    Activate Server
+    note right of Server: TCP channel read paused
+    Client-xServer: Send(5, message5)
+    Server-->>Client: SendReceipt(2,msgId2)
+    Server-->>Client: SendReceipt(3,msgId3)
+    Client-xServer: Send(6, message6)
+    Server-->>Client: SendReceipt(4,msgId4)
+    note right of Server: TCP channel read resumed
+    deactivate Server
+    Server-->>Server: read message 5
+    Server-->>Server: read message 6
+    Client->>Server: Send(7, message7)
+    Server-->>Client: SendReceipt(5,msgId5)
+    Server-->>Client: SendReceipt(6,msgId6)
+    Server-->>Client: SendReceipt(7,msgId7)
+
+    Client->>Server: CloseProducer(producerId, reqId)
+    Server-->>-Client: Success(reqId)
+    deactivate Client
+```
+
+## Challenges with the current approach
+
+The current approach may look perfectly fine when looking at the above 
example, but when looked from a wider scope,
+things start looking bad.
+Typically, the clients reuse a single TCP connection from the client to a 
broker to send messages to multiple topics.
+This is controlled by the client side property
+of 
[connectionsPerBroker](https://github.com/apache/pulsar/blob/4b3b273c1c57741f9f9da2118eb4ec5dfeee2220/pulsar-client/src/main/java/org/apache/pulsar/client/impl/conf/ClientConfigurationData.java#L135)
+which defaults to 1. The situation is worsened by the fact that typically, a 
client is used to create producers for
+partitioned topics and generally an application may produce to more than one 
partitioned topic with the producers
+created from the same client object, thus all sharing the same tcp connection.
+
+In this situation, even when a single topic starts breaching the quota, the 
entire TCP connection is paused leading to
+a noisy neighbour effect where effectively all the topics that the client is 
producing to start getting throttled and
+observe high latencies.
+
+# Motivation
+
+The current method of inducing throttling when a topic or connection breaches 
quota has various challenges:
+
+* **Noisy neighbors** - Even if one topic is exceeding the quota, since the 
entire channel read is paused, all topics
+  sharing the same connect (for example - using the same java client object) 
get rate limited.
+* **Unaware clients** - clients are completely unaware that they are being 
rate limited. This leads to all send calls
+  taking super long time or simply timing out (assuming shorter send 
timeouts). If clients were aware, they can either
+  fail fast or induce back-pressure to their upstream.
+* **Impossible debugging** - Since all topics emit the rate limit metric, it 
is practically impossible to figure out
+  which
+  actual topic is breaching the quota in order to update the topic policies.
+* **Missing protocol** - Since rate limiting is a first class citizen of 
messaging sub-system, it really should be
+  present as a response in the protocol as well.
+
+# Goals
+
+## In Scope
+
+* Introduce a new binary protocol command pair to notify clients about 
throttling and get an acknowledgement back from
+  the clients that they respect the throttling and will stop producing further 
until mentioned.
+    * If acknowledgement is received within a configured time, we do not pause 
the connection for further reads.
+* [Java client] Add client public API interface to indicate if a producer is 
being throttled.
+* [Java client] Add relevant new PulsarClientException and logic to throw 
throttling related exception instead of
+  timeout if needed.
+* [Java client] Add OTel metrics about rate limiting.
+
+## Out of Scope
+
+* Changing the core rate limiting logic.
+* Implementation for other language clients
+* Changes in other protocols
+
+# High Level Design
+
+## New binary protocol commands
+
+We introduce a new comment which server will send to clients - 
`ThrottleProducer(reqId, throttleData)` and server will
+expect an acknowledgement command back within a configured time window 
`ThrottleProducerReceipt(reqId)`.
+
+The broker already records different levels of throttling in one way or 
another via metrics or counters, both at a topic
+level and at a connection level as well. The main design idea is that wherever 
today we take action to pause the
+channel, we first instead send the `ThrottleProducer` command and if we 
receive the `ThrottleProducerReceipt` response,
+instead of pausing the channel, we rely on clients not sending further 
messages for the breaching topic. If the response
+doesn't come within the configured window, we continue to pause the channel as 
usual.
+
+For the **case where connection level breaches** happen - i.e. breach due to 
maxPendingPublishRequestsPerConnection,
+maxMessagePublishBufferSizeInMB or broker level rate limit - **we continue to 
pause the connection**, but we still send
+the `ThrottleProducer` command in order to inform the client about the reason 
for any potential timeout. The reason we
+continue to pause reads is that we are already breaching memory limits, thus, 
even if the client sends
+a `ThrottleProducerReceipt` response, we won't be able to read it until 
further pending messages before that are read.
+
+Here is a sequence diagram highlighting the case when a topic level breach 
happens:
+
+```mermaid
+%%{init: {"mirrorActors": false, "rightAngles": false} }%%
+sequenceDiagram
+    Client->>Server: CreateProducer(reqId, myTopic)
+    Note right of Server: Check Authorization
+    Server-->>Client: ProducerSuccess(reqId, producerName)
+    Activate Client
+    Activate Server
+    Client->>Server: Send(1, message1)
+    Client->>Server: Send(2, message2)
+    Server-->>Client: SendReceipt(1, msgId1)
+    Note right of Server: Check Throttling
+
+    opt topic/connection throttled
+        Server->>Client: ThrottleProducer(reqId, throttleData)
+        alt client sends receipt in time
+            Client-->>Server: ThrottleProducerReceipt(reqId)
+            note right of Client: client pauses till specified time
+            Note over Client, Server: After some time
+            Client->>Server: Send(3, message3)
+            Client->>Server: Send(4, message4)
+
+        else no response
+            Activate Server
+            note right of Server: TCP read paused
+            Client-xServer: Send(3, message3)
+            Note over Client, Server: After some time
+            opt topic/connection unthrottled
+                note right of Server: TCP read resumed
+                deactivate Server
+                Server-->>Server: read message 3
+                Client->>Server: Send(4, message4)
+            end
+        end
+    end
+    Server-->>Client: SendReceipt(2,msgId2)
+    Server-->>Client: SendReceipt(3,msgId3)
+    Server-->>Client: SendReceipt(4,msgId4)
+
+    Client->>Server: CloseProducer(producerId, reqId)
+    Server-->>-Client: Success(reqId)
+    deactivate Client
+```
+
+## Java client changes
+
+* Client will now have logic to understand the `ThrottleProducer` command and 
take relevant action of blocking further
+  messages for the relevant topic. It will then respond back with 
`ThrottleProducerReceipt` command.
+    * Client will resume message sending after the specified time in the 
`ThrottleProducer` command's data.
+    * This interval of no messages will be noted as "being throttled"
+    * Within this duration, another `ThrottleProducer` command from server may 
come.
+* Producer will record new OTel metric indicating which topic was throttled 
and the reason.
+* In case a message fails due to timeout and there was a throttled command 
from server for the owning topic, client will
+  instead throw a rate limit exception instead of timeout exception.
+
+# Detailed Design
+
+## High-level Implementation Details
+
+### Broker Changes
+
+* For calls arising from `PublishRateLimiterImpl` class, add logic in 
`ServerCnxThrottleTracker.java` to send the
+  command to client and wait for response for the max configured duration 
before calling `changeAutoRead`. It checks for
+  feature availability first.
+* For calls arising from `ServerCnxThrottleTracker::changeThrottlingFlag`, we 
send the command async (if feature
+  supported) without worrying about response and then call `changeAutoRead`.
+* capture `AbstractTopic::getTotalPublishRateLimitCounter` per publish rate 
limit counter and add relevant attribute in
+  the rate limit metric
+

Review Comment:
   > There seems to be a disconnect here. Let's take a step back.
   > 
   > A topic may have N number of producers, but when the topic beaches the 
quota, beyond that point, no further messages from _any_ of the N producers 
should be accommodated. As per the current design, all the connected producers 
of the topic will get the `ProducerThrottled` command and _all_ of the 
connected producers will pause further producer to the topic for the requested 
time.
   
   It's not a feasible approach to synchronize the commands across all producer 
and expect them to be paused all at once. Each producer will receive that 
command at a different point in time depending on different factors such as 
queue lengths. Each producer would be also producing at independent rate so the 
results not be uniform if all producers are paused for the same duration of 
time. 
   
   > I still don't really understand where the "fair queuing" comes into 
picture here? Since rate limiting works at a topic granularity and not a 
producer granularity, we can't really do anything fair for the producers. Even 
if priorities come into picture, I believe, by design, they should be at a 
topic level and not at producer level.
   
   When you have multiple producers producing to the same topic, the 
expectation is that each producer would be able to produce roughly the same 
amount of messages. Isn't that a reasonable expectation?
   
   > Please explain how it doesn't support multiple producers? If current rate 
limiting supports multiple producers, I am not degrading anything from that. 
Unless you mean to say that current rate limiting design and implementation in 
pulsar also doesn't support multiple producers.
   
   In the current solution fair queuing is relatively easy to achieve since 
there isn't a long feedback cycle in the way how rate limiting is controlled 
with the TCP level throttling. In the producer throttle command based solution, 
there's a relatively long delay from the point in time when the command is sent 
to the producer until it impacts the rate limiting. That changes the dynamics 
in a way that makes it harder to avoid the buffers growing on the broker side 
and hitting limits which require TCP level throttling. The producer throttle 
command will work only in the case that it's able to keep the buffers on the 
broker side in control so that the limits aren't hit. When the producer 
produces faster than the limit, it will be constantly hitting the limit and 
there will be a need to throttle and un-throttle to keep the rate between the 
limits. The broker will have to predict when to send the command so that this 
strategy would be effectively. 
   
   > 
   > Again, @lhotari - I would request you to give an example of what you are 
calling "fair queuing among producers of a single topic" and how are multiple 
producers not supported in the current proposal.
   
   I hope that the above explanations provide more clarity. Let's say that you 
have a rate limit of 1 MB/s and there are 3 producers currently sending at 
500kB/s, 100kB/s and 5MB/s. The "fair queuing" aspect of this is that the 
expectation is that each producer is able to produce about 333kB/s. If all 
producers would be pausing the same amount of time, the producer with the 
highest current rate would be getting most of the bandwidth. The producer with 
the highest throughput would likely also have the longest queue length and 
that's why sending the producer command would take longer to take effect on 
that producer. Eventually it would pause for the duration specified in the 
producer throttle command. The pausing will start at a different point of time 
and also end at a different point in time. That's not a problem itself. The 
problem is the lack of fairness. 
   The reason why I was explaining the importance of having the RTT information 
is that the commands could be sent early so that the broker buffers says in the 
limits so that the broker doesn't have to use TCP throttling to prevent the 
buffers growing over limits. I hope this explanation helps.
   



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