ALTQ


ALTQ is the network scheduler for Berkeley Software Distribution. ALTQ provides queueing disciplines and other quality of service related components required to realize resource sharing. It is most commonly implemented on BSD-based routers. ALTQ is included in the base distribution of FreeBSD, NetBSD, and DragonFly BSD, and was integrated into the pf packet filter of OpenBSD but later replaced by a new queueing subsystem.
With ALTQ, packets can be assigned to queues for the purpose of bandwidth control. The scheduler defines the algorithm used to decide which packets get delayed, dropped or sent out immediately. There are five schedulers currently supported in the FreeBSD implementation of ALTQ: