Network transmit queue limits

Posted Aug 24, 2011 15:03 UTC (Wed) by wtanksleyjr (subscriber, #74601)
In reply to: Network transmit queue limits by dlang
Parent article: Network transmit queue limits

It seems to me -- ignorance alert! -- that the problem isn't the bytes or the time at all; it's the variance. The purpose of a queue isn't to make a device send faster or slower; it's to cover up variance.

The sources of the variance will have to be considered carefully; variance caused by time delays on the output is probably different from that caused by multiple clients asynchronously loading data into the input.

Network transmit queue limits

Posted Aug 12, 2013 4:42 UTC (Mon) by shentino (guest, #76459) [Link]

The purpose of the device queue is actually to maximize throughput by keeping the interface busy without having to pester the kernel for new packets.

Especially if the kernel is busy with something else and can't immediately handle an interrupt.

And since the queue is being digested by the hardware itself in many cases, the kernel can't just tinker with it willy nilly.