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by kmeisthax 585 days ago
Dumb question: why was it decided to only provide an unreliable datagram protocol in standard IP transit?
1 comments

Because when you're sending a signal down a wire or through the air, fundamentally the communication medium only provides "Send it, maybe it arrives"

At any time, the receiver could lose power. Or a burst of interference could disrupt the radio link. Or a backhoe could slice through the cable. Or many other things.

IP merely reflects this physical reality.

Ok, but why does TCP exist, then? If we could make streams reliable in the late 1970s why didn't we apply that to datagrams as well?