Question : Why do we need global-agent at all?

[MaciekLeks]

Hi,

We experienced significant issues with an older version of the axios package and our corporate proxy. Starting from a certain point in time, every second execution of some code would finish with an error. Before that, it occurred randomly:

Error: socket hang up
    at connResetException (node:internal/errors:721:14)
    at Socket.socketOnEnd (node:_http_client:519:23)
    at Socket.emit (node:events:526:35)
    at endReadableNT (node:internal/streams/readable:1408:12)
    at process.processTicksAndRejections (node:internal/process/task_queues:82:21) {
  code: 'ECONNRESET',
config: {
    url: '[https://[redacted]/services/data/v59.0/jobs/query/7500D00000A4oZ0QAJ/results?locator=MTAwMDAw&maxRecords=20000'](https://[redacted]/services/data/v59.0/jobs/query/7500D00000A4oZ0QAJ/results?locator=MTAwMDAw&maxRecords=20000%27),
    method: 'get',
    headers: {
      Accept: 'text/csv',
      'Content-Type': 'application/json',
      Authorization: 'Bearer [redacted]',
      'User-Agent': 'axios/0.21.4',
      host: '[redacted]'
    },
    transformRequest: [ [Function: transformRequest] ],
    transformResponse: [ [Function: transformResponse] ],
    timeout: 0,
    adapter: [Function: httpAdapter],
    xsrfCookieName: 'XSRF-TOKEN',
    xsrfHeaderName: 'X-XSRF-TOKEN',
    maxContentLength: Infinity,
    maxBodyLength: Infinity,
    validateStatus: [Function: validateStatus],
    transitional: {
      silentJSONParsing: true,
      forcedJSONParsing: true,
      clarifyTimeoutError: false
    },
    data: undefined
  },
  request: <ref *1> Writable {
    _writableState: WritableState {
      state: 802924,
      highWaterMark: 16384,
      defaultEncoding: 'utf8',
      length: 0,
      corked: 0,
      onwrite: [Function: bound onwrite],
      writecb: null,
      writelen: 0,
      afterWriteTickInfo: null,
      buffered: [],
      bufferedIndex: 0,
      pendingcb: 0,
      errored: null,
      [Symbol(kOnFinished)]: []
    },
    _events: [Object: null prototype] {
      response: [Function: handleResponse],
      error: [Function: handleRequestError]
    },
    _eventsCount: 2,
    _maxListeners: undefined,
    _options: {
      maxRedirects: 21,
      maxBodyLength: Infinity,
      protocol: 'http:',
      path: '[https://[redacted]/services/data/v59.0/jobs/query/7500D00000A4oZ0QAJ/results?locator=MTAwMDAw&maxRecords=20000'](https://[redacted]/services/data/v59.0/jobs/query/7500D00000A4oZ0QAJ/results?locator=MTAwMDAw&maxRecords=20000%27),
      method: 'GET',
      headers: [Object],
      agent: undefined,
      agents: [Object],
      auth: undefined,
      hostname: '[proxy-host-redacted]',
      port: '3128',
      beforeRedirect: [Function: beforeRedirect],
      nativeProtocols: [Object],
      pathname: '[redacted]/services/data/v59.0/jobs/query/7500D00000A4oZ0QAJ/results',
      search: '?locator=MTAwMDAw&maxRecords=20000'
    },
    _ended: true,
    _ending: true,
    _redirectCount: 0,
    _redirects: [],
    _requestBodyLength: 0,
    _requestBodyBuffers: [],
    _onNativeResponse: [Function (anonymous)],
    _currentRequest: ClientRequest {
      _events: [Object: null prototype],
      _eventsCount: 7,
      _maxListeners: undefined,
      outputData: [],
      outputSize: 0,
      writable: true,
      destroyed: false,
      _last: true,
      chunkedEncoding: false,
      shouldKeepAlive: true,
      maxRequestsOnConnectionReached: false,
      _defaultKeepAlive: true,
      useChunkedEncodingByDefault: false,
      sendDate: false,
      _removedConnection: false,
      _removedContLen: false,
      _removedTE: false,
      strictContentLength: false,
      _contentLength: 0,
      _hasBody: true,
      _trailer: '',
      finished: true,
      _headerSent: true,
      _closed: false,
      socket: [Socket],
      _header: 'GET https://[redacted]/services/data/v59.0/jobs/query/7500D00000A4oZ0QAJ/results?locator=MTAwMDAw&maxRecords=20000 HTTP/1.1\r\n' +
        'Accept: text/csv\r\n' +
        'Content-Type: application/json\r\n' +
        'Authorization: Bearer [redacted] +
        'User-Agent: axios/0.21.4\r\n' +
        'host: [redaced]\r\n' +
        'Connection: keep-alive\r\n' +
        '\r\n',
      _keepAliveTimeout: 0,
      _onPendingData: [Function: nop],
      agent: [Agent],
      socketPath: undefined,
      method: 'GET',
      maxHeaderSize: undefined,
      insecureHTTPParser: undefined,
      joinDuplicateHeaders: undefined,
      path: 'https://[redacted]/services/data/v59.0/jobs/query/7[500](https://[redacted]/results?locator=MTAwMDAw&maxRecords=20000',
      _ended: false,
      res: null,
      aborted: false,
      timeoutCb: [Function: emitRequestTimeout],
      upgradeOrConnect: false,
      parser: null,
      maxHeadersCount: null,
      reusedSocket: true,
      host: 'gitlab-proxy.cybersec',
      protocol: 'http:',
      _redirectable: [Circular *1],
      [Symbol(kCapture)]: false,
      [Symbol(kBytesWritten)]: 0,
      [Symbol(kNeedDrain)]: false,
      [Symbol(corked)]: 0,
      [Symbol(kOutHeaders)]: [Object: null prototype],
      [Symbol(errored)]: null,
      [Symbol(kHighWaterMark)]: 16384,
      [Symbol(kRejectNonStandardBodyWrites)]: false,
      [Symbol(kUniqueHeaders)]: null
    },
    _currentUrl: '[https://[redacted]/services/data/v59.0/jobs/query/7500D00000A4oZ0QAJ/results?locator=MTAwMDAw&maxRecords=20000'](https://[redacted]/services/data/v59.0/jobs/query/7500D00000A4oZ0QAJ/results?locator=MTAwMDAw&maxRecords=20000%27),
    [Symbol(kCapture)]: false
  },
  response: undefined,
  isAxiosError: true,
  toJSON: [Function: toJSON]
}

When we enabled global-agent, all the problems disappeared. One of our colleague said that the problem lies in the infrastructure, not in axios itself.

Who is right? And why do you develop and maintain this "unnecessary" tool if the problem lies in the infrastructure? ;)

P.S. I'm not a Node.js expert. I'm responsible for the infrastructure, but I'm 100% sure that the packets were not reset (L4/TCP/RST), as suggested by the axios error below.

Best regards,
Maciek