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Date:      Thu, 8 Jun 2000 19:21:57 +1200
From:      Dave Preece <dave.preece@kbgroup.co.nz>
To:        "Kenneth D. Merry" <ken@kdm.org>
Cc:        freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org
Subject:   RE: Path MTU discovery.
Message-ID:  <67B808B0DD93D211ABEE0000B498356B02BC71@internet.kbgroup.co.nz>

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> > Just learning about this: I can see the advantages but does 
> anything use it?
> 
> Sure, TCP uses it.
> 
> TCP (at least in FreeBSD) sets the "don't frag" bit on all 
> its outgoing
> packets.

Good lord, so it does. Mental note, packet sniff before posting in future. 

So... thinking about what this means for firewalls and natd. If we block all
incoming ICMP's across the firewall, it is quite possible that a server
behind the firewall could completely fail to send packets to a client on a
smaller MTU (modem user with MTU set to 576, for instance).

Likewise natd would need to look at an incoming ICMP and if it's a "can't
fragment" message, address translate it and send it onwards back to the IP
that caused the error to happen.

Hmmmmm. I'll hit the books. Return to the temple of Mr Stevens.

Dave :)

BTW, NT appears to set the DF flag too. If you cared.



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