REST API calls respond with a lot of chunked packets

Summary

When initiating a REST API call, Confluence returns the data in chunked packets contaning small payload. This generates lots of traffic on the network and if you don't have a proxy or a load balancer that can repackage those packets for optimization, you might end up with packets drop or packet retransmission.

Environment

Confluence Server or Data Center

Steps to Reproduce

1. Start Confluence
2. Login to Confluence and go to Recently Viewed or Recently Worked On (these will trigger rest calls)
3. You can also fire a rest call using curl

   curl -u admin:admin -X GET http://localhost:8090/confluence/rest/api/content/123456789 | python -mjson.tool
   

Steps to Monitor the traffic

1. Install Wireshark on your client machine
2. Start Recording
3. Run the curl or refresh the page
4. Stop Recording
5. Inspect the tcp dump

You will notice the following:
REST Call Request

REST Call details

REST Call Response

REST Call Response chunks

REST Cal Response chunks

Expected Results

Confluence responds with an optimal number of packets.
number of packets = (data-in-bytes / max-payload) + 1 (if data-in-bytes % max-payload > 0)

Actual Results

Confluence responds with chunked packets containing little payload which increases the traffic on the network

Workaround

The only workaround is to have a load balancer or reverse proxy that supports network repackaging to optimize that traffic