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Informational 23 Bitcoin

connectd: don't toggle nagle on and off, leave it always off.

Public commit record

What the developer wrote

Authored by Rusty Russell

73/100 · Adequate
connectd: don't toggle nagle on and off, leave it always off.

We're doing our own buffering now.

We leave the is_urgent() function for two commits in the future though.

Signed-off-by: Rusty Russell <rusty@rustcorp.com.au>
✓ Specific, descriptive subject✓ Names a concrete action or component✓ Provides detailed explanatory context
The short version

What changed, and why it matters

This change simplifies how Core Lightning's networking layer handles TCP packet batching. Previously, the code repeatedly turned a kernel feature called Nagle's algorithm on and off for each message depending on whether it was 'urgent.' Now it just leaves Nagle disabled all the time. The practical effect is lower latency for time-sensitive Lightning messages and less risk of inconsistent behavior across operating systems. It is not a fix for a known exploit, but it removes a fragile, platform-dependent mechanism that could have caused message delays or odd edge cases.

Recommended action

Treat as a hardening/cleanup commit. Review whether any remaining references to peer->urgent or is_urgent() are cleaned up in the promised follow-up commits. No immediate security response is indicated, but operators should ensure they run a version that includes this change to avoid the prior inconsistent cross-platform behavior.

Security signals we found

01

Removal of dynamic TCP_NODELAY toggling reduces per-message setsockopt surface

02

New helper centralizes socket option setting at socket creation time

03

Guard added to avoid setting TCP options on UNIX domain sockets

04

Commentary in removed code acknowledged platform-specific behavior and potential for one extra packet on non-Linux platforms

Risk score

Why this scored 23/100

Our methodology →
Potential impact 4/30
Exploitability 2/25
Stealth signal 3/15
Affected reach 5/15
Confidence 6/10
Evidence quality 3/5
Human-validated context

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