The document outlines Daniel Stenberg's roadmap for curl in 2020, emphasizing the importance of community contributions and prioritizing security and privacy. Key developments include support for HTTP/3, DNS-over-TLS, and improvements in thread safety and performance. The release cycle is structured with an 8-week period for feature merging and bug fixes, with openness to user suggestions for future developments.

1. Roadmap 2020

2. Daniel Stenberg
Swedish, living in
Sweden
Lead developer and
architect of curl
Employed by and
works for wolfSSL
Started the curl
project in March 1998
@bagder@bagder

3. Roadmapping in a volunteer worldRoadmapping in a volunteer world
Release cycleRelease cycle
How things are mergedHow things are merged
On the roadmapOn the roadmap
Brain-storm stuffBrain-storm stuff
Q&AQ&A
@bagder@bagder

4. @bagder@bagder

5. Daniel’s Roadmap
Ideas Daniel and wolfSSL plan to work on in 2020
Curl is open source and everyone is welcome to bring
features and work that we haven’t planned or anticipated
We only merge code into curl that is “curl worthy”
There’s no guarantee that this actually will happen
@bagder@bagder

6. Daniel’s Roadmap guide
Remain “Swiss army knife of Internet Protocols”
Power the world of Internet enabled devices and tools
Aid protocol developers and tinkerers
Support bleeding edge protocol versions and features
Security and privacy are prioritized areas
@bagder@bagder

7. wolfSSL curl
Attempt to “listen in” what users want
wolfSSL is the best and only commercial curl support
option
wolfSSL employs Daniel
@bagder@bagder

8. The curl release cycle explained
Release on Wednesday, every 8 weeks (unless
circumstances make us change)
The first 4 weeks we allow merging new features (changes)
The subsequent 4 weeks we only merge bug-fixes
Repeat, forever
@bagder@bagder

9. How we merge changes
✔ Submit pull-request on github.com/curl/curl (yes, Daniel
as well)
✔ Get feedback
✔ Adjust to feedback
✔ Make sure the CI builds are green
✔ Merge into master
✔ Ship in next release
@bagder@bagder

10. RoadmapRoadmap
@bagder@bagder

11. On the mapOn the map
HTTP/3
HSTS
ESNI
Thread-safe curl_global_init
Thread-safe connection-
sharing
@bagder@bagder
Tinier tiny-curl
MQTT
DNS-over-TLS
Hardcoded localhost
*

12. HTTP/3HTTP/3
Protocol is being defined
Initial support has landed
Built on quiche or ngtcp2/nghttp3
Further work remain (including alt-svc)
@bagder@bagder

13. HSTSHSTS
Preload a set
Parse incoming headers
Cache dynamically
“Internal redirects” from HTTP to HTTPS
Not so much to load the full browser preload set
@bagder@bagder

14. ESNI (Encrypted Server Name Indication)ESNI (Encrypted Server Name Indication)
Removes the last clear text part in TLS
The spec is still in draft
Cloudflare deploys an old draft
https://github.com/curl/curl/pull/4468
https://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-tls-esni-06
@bagder@bagder

15. Thread-safe curl_global_initThread-safe curl_global_init
Current limits cause grief
Limitation mostly historic
Cleanup our own backyard first
Then thread-safe if using “proper” dependencies
@bagder@bagder

16. Thread-safe connection-sharingThread-safe connection-sharing
Sharing the connection “cache” among threads
allows applications to scale and perform better
libcurl already offers this feature, but it is buggy
and not done right
Solving this proper will take some rearranging. It
isn’t clear yet exactly how or what.
@bagder@bagder

17. Tinier tiny-curlTinier tiny-curl
Tiny-curl is for HTTPS GET < 100 Kb
Trim off more by compartmentalizing data better
+ ports to more tiny RTOSes
@bagder@bagder

18. MQTTMQTT
MQTT is not a perfect fit, but commonly used
Voted popular feature in recent poll
Base on wolfMQTT
@bagder@bagder

19. DNS-over-TLS (DoT)DNS-over-TLS (DoT)
Offers another way to secure name resolves
Used similarly to DoH (DNS-over-HTTPS)
Can share some of the code written for DoH
@bagder@bagder

20. Hardcode localhostHardcode localhost
Provide “internal resolve” for localhost
Removes risk for accidental DNS resolve
Faster
Done by some OSes already
@bagder@bagder

21. Customize roadmapCustomize roadmap
What features do you need?
What Internet protocol changes and demands do
you see coming in 2020?
Which of these roadmap entries should be
prioritized? (And which should not)
@bagder@bagder

22. No command line tool changes?
Nothing planned
Things will turn up and get done anyway
Suggestions?
@bagder@bagder

23. Brain-storm territory
@bagder@bagder

24. Websockets?
Top request in user surveys
Doesn’t fit the model very well
Many users still “kick off” websockets
with curl
@bagder@bagder

25. Multi-thread libcurl?
Aid high performance transfers
API to help multicore use
@bagder@bagder

26. C++ binding?C++ binding?
“Blessed” and provided by the curl project
Tighter integration between libcurl and C++
Keep up with libcurl
The binding that never was
But do we need it?
@bagder@bagder

27. 27
RoadmapRoadmap
@bagder@bagder

28. Learn more about curl!
https://curl.haxx.se/
https://www.wolfssl.com/products/curl/
support@wolfssl.com
@bagder@bagder