[tor-talk] Guard flag vs relay bandwidth

[Roman Mamedov]

Hello,

I am looking for ways to optimize several relay nodes to ensure maximum
possible bandwidth consumption. The actual numbers I have are within 20-50
megabits in one direction per node (i.e. not the gigabit-scale tuning discussed
in the FAQ).

From what I can tell the Guard flag affects routed bandwidth very negatively.
After getting the flag the bandwidth drops off sharply and a Guard node will
typically push an order of magnitude (TEN times) less traffic than a non-guard
one. This is confirmed by some blog and mailing list posts I found, mentioning
that a node will have its traffic drop after receiving the guard flag.

I wonder if can anything can be done about this. Can a torrc option be added to
set that a relay never wants to become a Guard; can the algorithms be tuned
so that Guards also keep receiving more 'casual' traffic (sorry if my
understanding is not consistent with how this actually works); or as a brute
hack should I reset my nodes' private key and fingerprint e.g. every couple of
weeks (but ramping up from scratch takes a lot of time and may nullify any
benefit from even doing so).

-- 
With respect,
Roman
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