the.com/contention window
the polite chaos where devices flip coins to decide who gets to talk first.
means a randomized waiting period networked devices use before transmitting, so simultaneous senders back off instead of colliding forever.
from born with ethernet and csma/ca protocols, where engineers realized letting everyone shout at once just guarantees nobody's heard.
wifi mechanismdoubles window size after each collision detected
randomness purposeprevents devices from retrying at identical moments
tradeoffwider window means less collision, more latency