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NTT DoCoMo Asks Google To Limit Android Data Use

Posted by Soulskill on from the buy-more-ether-instead dept.

An anonymous reader writes "NTT DoCoMo has had enough of Android's effects on its mobile network in Japan. Following a service disruption due to Google's Android VoIP app, the company is now asking Google to look at reducing Android's data use. In particular, the amount of time allowed between control signals being sent either by official apps or 3rd party ones. Typically these occur as often as every 3 minutes, but scale that up to thousands of apps on millions of handsets and you can see the issue DoCoMo has. So, does DoCoMo need to invest more in its infrastructure, or is Android a data hog that needs reining in?"

7 of 160 comments (clear)

  1. Well that depends... by Ragun · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If all they are asking is for Google to optimize its network usage, as the article seems to imply, go all out.

    If its telling Google to try and control the amount of bandwidth the users decide to use, well, I think they are going to have a little trouble getting that done.

    1. Re:Well that depends... by kbielefe · · Score: 5, Informative

      It's not that simple on a wireless connection where everyone shares the medium. For communications originating at the phone, the network provider can't do any throttling until the packet has already been received at their equipment, because they don't control the phone's transmitter. By that time, the bandwidth on the wireless link has already been consumed and wasn't available to other users. If the control signals originate at the server, the network provider could throttle it, but setting it up isn't trivial, and then you have problems like the servers sending retries because they aren't getting responses from the phone. The best solution requires cooperation from the OS and/or application writers.

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    2. Re:Well that depends... by Andy+Dodd · · Score: 5, Informative

      Docomo seems to claim that it's background sync/checking traffic - but Google makes a point of reducing this as much as possible. There's good reason to do this - the less often data is transferred to keep "checked in", the less often a device needs to wake up, and the better battery life is.

      This is, for example, why IM apps that use Google C2DM (Such as Google Talk - but any IM app author can use C2DM) have a minimal impact on battery life, while poorly written apps that are not even remotely suited to mobile devices (like Skype) are massive battery hogs.

      If Google's services are "checking in" that often on DoCoMo, it's probably because DoCoMo's NAT boxes are broken - http://conferences.sigcomm.org/sigcomm/2011/slides/s374.pdf

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    3. Re:Well that depends... by similar_name · · Score: 5, Informative

      They have a right to make money in return

      No, they have the right to try to make money in return. If they can't make money without constantly changing the rules instead of their strategy they should go out of business. I'm sure others could use the spectrum.

  2. NTT DoCoMo is the standard gold of mobile networks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Having been to Japan, and several locations around the world, I can say with fair certainty that NTT DoCoMo has the best network service I have *ever* seen. It allowed me to measure what is due to the iPhone's failings, and what is due to the network operator's failings. By contrast, in New York, AT&T makes getting signal a game of hide and seek. France stands somewhere in between the depths of AT&T and glory of NTT DoCoMo.

    All this to say that if NTT DoCoMo feels Android is unoptimized... than I pretty much take their word for it.

  3. Control signals- NOT Data by sonicmerlin · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Uh... Control signals have nothing to do with overall data consumption quantities. When you send a text message, you send the 160 or so bytes of data through control signals. The issue here is that Android doesn't control the way its apps try to contact the towers, basically hammering them if they don't respond properly. This issue is one of the reasons Android has massive standby battery drain problems, as detailed in this 300 page xda thread: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1179809

    The galaxy nexus has its own 100+ page thread dedicated to battery drain on standby.

  4. Re:NTT DoCoMo is the standard gold of mobile netwo by Andy+Dodd · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Considering that Google has a SERIOUS interest in making control signal intervals as long as possible for battery life purposes - if they are too often, the carriers only have themselves to blame. Too many carriers have aggressive NAT firewalls with short TCP connection timeouts, and it's much better for the handset AND the carrier to send a keepalive within that timeout period than to have to detect a dead connection and set up a new one.

    Google "netpiculet" or look at my last post earlier on this article for an eye-opener of how network providers shoot themselves in the foot.

    If Google is sending control signals too often - DoCoMo should take it up with the carriers that deployed broke-ass NAT boxes that forced Google to do this.

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