Make route path selection optimize strictly for cost / amount

Currently, after we've selected a number of candidate paths, we
construct a route from a random set of paths repeatedly, and then
select the route with the lowest total cost. In the vast majority
of cases this ends up doing a bunch of additional work in order to
select the path(s) with the total lowest cost, with some vague
attempt at randomization that doesn't actually work.

Instead, here, we simply sort available paths by `cost / amount`
and select the top paths. This ends up in practice having the same
end result with substantially less complexity. In some rare cases
it gets a better result, which also would have been achieved
through more random trials. This implies there may in such cases be
a potential privacy loss, but not a substantial one, given our path
selection is ultimately mostly deterministic in many cases (or, if
it is not, then privacy is achieved through randomization at the
scorer level).

Author: TheBlueMatt

lightning/src/routing/router.rs

@@ -754,7 +754,7 @@ where L::Target: Logger, GL::Target: Logger {
 pub(crate) fn get_route<L: Deref, S: Score>(
 	our_node_pubkey: &PublicKey, payment_params: &PaymentParameters, network_graph: &ReadOnlyNetworkGraph,
 	first_hops: Option<&[&ChannelDetails]>, final_value_msat: u64, final_cltv_expiry_delta: u32,
-	logger: L, scorer: &S, random_seed_bytes: &[u8; 32]
+	logger: L, scorer: &S, _random_seed_bytes: &[u8; 32]
 ) -> Result<Route, LightningError>
 where L::Target: Logger {
 	let payee_node_id = NodeId::from_pubkey(&payment_params.payee_pubkey);
@@ -796,11 +796,11 @@ where L::Target: Logger {
 	// 4. See if we managed to collect paths which aggregately are able to transfer target value
 	//    (not recommended value).
 	// 5. If yes, proceed. If not, fail routing.
-	// 6. Randomly combine paths into routes having enough to fulfill the payment. (TODO: knapsack)
-	// 7. Of all the found paths, select only those with the lowest total fee.
-	// 8. The last path in every selected route is likely to be more than we need.
-	//    Reduce its value-to-transfer and recompute fees.
-	// 9. Choose the best route by the lowest total fee.
+	// 6. Select the paths which have the lowest cost (fee plus scorer penalty) per amount
+	//    transferred up to the transfer target value.
+	// 7. Reduce the value of the last path until we are sending only the target value.
+	// 8. If our maximum channel saturation limit caused us to pick two identical paths, combine
+	//    them so that we're not sending two HTLCs along the same path.
 
 	// As for the actual search algorithm,
 	// we do a payee-to-payer pseudo-Dijkstra's sorting by each node's distance from the payee
@@ -1655,96 +1655,55 @@ where L::Target: Logger {
 		return Err(LightningError{err: "Failed to find a sufficient route to the given destination".to_owned(), action: ErrorAction::IgnoreError});
 	}
 
-	// Sort by total fees and take the best paths.
-	payment_paths.sort_unstable_by_key(|path| path.get_total_fee_paid_msat());
-	if payment_paths.len() > 50 {
-		payment_paths.truncate(50);
-	}
+	// Step (6).
+	let mut selected_route = payment_paths;
 
-	// Draw multiple sufficient routes by randomly combining the selected paths.
-	let mut drawn_routes = Vec::new();
-	let mut prng = ChaCha20::new(random_seed_bytes, &[0u8; 12]);
-	let mut random_index_bytes = [0u8; ::core::mem::size_of::<usize>()];
+	debug_assert_eq!(selected_route.iter().map(|p| p.get_value_msat()).sum::<u64>(), already_collected_value_msat);
+	let mut overpaid_value_msat = already_collected_value_msat - final_value_msat;
 
-	let num_permutations = payment_paths.len();
-	for _ in 0..num_permutations {
-		let mut cur_route = Vec::<PaymentPath>::new();
-		let mut aggregate_route_value_msat = 0;
+	// First, sort by the cost-per-value of the path, dropping the paths that cost the most for
+	// the value they contribute towards the payment amount.
+	// We sort in descending order as we will remove from the front in `retain`, next.
+	selected_route.sort_unstable_by(|a, b|
+		(((b.get_cost_msat() as u128) << 64) / (b.get_value_msat() as u128))
+			.cmp(&(((a.get_cost_msat() as u128) << 64) / (a.get_value_msat() as u128)))
+	);
 
-		// Step (6).
-		// Do a Fisher-Yates shuffle to create a random permutation of the payment paths
-		for cur_index in (1..payment_paths.len()).rev() {
-			prng.process_in_place(&mut random_index_bytes);
-			let random_index = usize::from_be_bytes(random_index_bytes).wrapping_rem(cur_index+1);
-			payment_paths.swap(cur_index, random_index);
+	// We should make sure that at least 1 path left.
+	let mut paths_left = selected_route.len();
+	selected_route.retain(|path| {
+		if paths_left == 1 {
+			return true
+		}
+		let path_value_msat = path.get_value_msat();
+		if path_value_msat <= overpaid_value_msat {
+			overpaid_value_msat -= path_value_msat;
+			paths_left -= 1;
+			return false;
 		}
+		true
+	});
+	debug_assert!(selected_route.len() > 0);
 
+	if overpaid_value_msat != 0 {
 		// Step (7).
-		for payment_path in &payment_paths {
-			cur_route.push(payment_path.clone());
-			aggregate_route_value_msat += payment_path.get_value_msat();
-			if aggregate_route_value_msat > final_value_msat {
-				// Last path likely overpaid. Substract it from the most expensive
-				// (in terms of proportional fee) path in this route and recompute fees.
-				// This might be not the most economically efficient way, but fewer paths
-				// also makes routing more reliable.
-				let mut overpaid_value_msat = aggregate_route_value_msat - final_value_msat;
-
-				// First, we drop some expensive low-value paths entirely if possible, since fewer
-				// paths is better: the payment is less likely to fail. In order to do so, we sort
-				// by value and fall back to total fees paid, i.e., in case of equal values we
-				// prefer lower cost paths.
-				cur_route.sort_unstable_by(|a, b| {
-					a.get_value_msat().cmp(&b.get_value_msat())
-						// Reverse ordering for cost, so we drop higher-cost paths first
-						.then_with(|| b.get_cost_msat().cmp(&a.get_cost_msat()))
-				});
-
-				// We should make sure that at least 1 path left.
-				let mut paths_left = cur_route.len();
-				cur_route.retain(|path| {
-					if paths_left == 1 {
-						return true
-					}
-					let mut keep = true;
-					let path_value_msat = path.get_value_msat();
-					if path_value_msat <= overpaid_value_msat {
-						keep = false;
-						overpaid_value_msat -= path_value_msat;
-						paths_left -= 1;
-					}
-					keep
-				});
-
-				if overpaid_value_msat == 0 {
-					break;
-				}
+		// Now, subtract the remaining overpaid value from the most-expensive path.
+		// TODO: this could also be optimized by also sorting by feerate_per_sat_routed,
+		// so that the sender pays less fees overall. And also htlc_minimum_msat.
+		selected_route.sort_unstable_by(|a, b| {
+			let a_f = a.hops.iter().map(|hop| hop.0.candidate.fees().proportional_millionths as u64).sum::<u64>();
+			let b_f = b.hops.iter().map(|hop| hop.0.candidate.fees().proportional_millionths as u64).sum::<u64>();
+			a_f.cmp(&b_f).then_with(|| b.get_cost_msat().cmp(&a.get_cost_msat()))
+		});
+		let expensive_payment_path = selected_route.first_mut().unwrap();
 
-				assert!(cur_route.len() > 0);
-
-				// Step (8).
-				// Now, subtract the overpaid value from the most-expensive path.
-				// TODO: this could also be optimized by also sorting by feerate_per_sat_routed,
-				// so that the sender pays less fees overall. And also htlc_minimum_msat.
-				cur_route.sort_unstable_by_key(|path| { path.hops.iter().map(|hop| hop.0.candidate.fees().proportional_millionths as u64).sum::<u64>() });
-				let expensive_payment_path = cur_route.first_mut().unwrap();
-
-				// We already dropped all the small value paths above, meaning all the
-				// remaining paths are larger than remaining overpaid_value_msat.
-				// Thus, this can't be negative.
-				let expensive_path_new_value_msat = expensive_payment_path.get_value_msat() - overpaid_value_msat;
-				expensive_payment_path.update_value_and_recompute_fees(expensive_path_new_value_msat);
-				break;
-			}
-		}
-		drawn_routes.push(cur_route);
+		// We already dropped all the paths with value below `overpaid_value_msat` above, thus this
+		// can't go negative.
+		let expensive_path_new_value_msat = expensive_payment_path.get_value_msat() - overpaid_value_msat;
+		expensive_payment_path.update_value_and_recompute_fees(expensive_path_new_value_msat);
 	}
 
-	// Step (9).
-	// Select the best route by lowest total cost.
-	drawn_routes.sort_unstable_by_key(|paths| paths.iter().map(|path| path.get_cost_msat()).sum::<u64>());
-	let selected_route = drawn_routes.first_mut().unwrap();
-
+	// Step (8).
 	// Sort by the path itself and combine redundant paths.
 	// Note that we sort by SCIDs alone as its simpler but when combining we have to ensure we
 	// compare both SCIDs and NodeIds as individual nodes may use random aliases causing collisions