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Semicolony ELI5 · comic

Rate limiting.

A bouncer at the door letting people in at a steady pace, not all at once.

  1. In! In! In!
    all at once
    1

    A service buckles when everyone shows up at once and pounds on it.

  2. One at a time, folks.
    one at a time
    2

    So you put a bouncer on the door who admits people at a steady pace.

  3. this caller, this minute 7 / 10 count it against the cap
    3

    For each caller, he keeps a tally: how many requests this minute, against the cap.

  4. Come back in a minute.
    429 too many requests
    4

    Over the cap, you are turned away with a 429 until the window resets.

  5. drips back, steadily each request spends a token
    5

    The token-bucket trick: each request spends a token, and tokens drip back at a fixed rate.

  6. Saved these up.
    saved up a short burst, fairly
    6

    A quiet caller banks tokens, so it can briefly burst — generous, but never over the average.

A bouncer on the door, letting callers in at a steady pace instead of all at once.
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