This is an original planning guide. It is not a vendor manual, an official standard, or legal advice. Example addresses use documentation ranges. Review every command before you paste it.
What this hour is for
Bufferbloat is delay that grows because a queue is deep. The tool subtracts an idle latency from a loaded latency that you type. It does not send traffic. A large gap means the queue is building on a path you measured.
The link has to be one you administer. Do not load a circuit other people are using, and do not load a network you do not run, to produce the second number. If you do not have a loaded sample, write that the test has not been done.
A shaper that would shrink the queue is a later ticket. This page records the two numbers.
The change you can finish
Apply nothing during the writing of the note. When the lab window opens, it is one change on the device named in the ticket. Read the draft, then the device, then decide.
Rollback is the file or the revision you saved first. You do not invent a rollback after the only copy is gone.
- Write the idle delay.
- Write the loaded delay only if you already measured your link.
- Read the gap.
- Do not flood a link.
- Plan any shaper for later.
- Stop.
Mistakes that outlive the command
Bufferbloat Explained goes wrong in a small set of ways. The list is here so the ticket can forbid them before the window.
- Flooding a network you do not administer.
- Loading a shared production link for sport.
- A gap with no idle number.
- Changing a shaper during the reading.
Decisions to write down
One decision for Bufferbloat Explained: The link is yours. Both numbers are real or the loaded one is absent. No flood was sent. No shaper was changed. And the gap is labeled.
Checks before you call it done
Confirm this before you call the change done: Idle delay is written. Loaded delay is written or marked missing. The gap is written. No traffic was sent. And no policy was changed. If one of those fails, stop.
Before you leave the device
Bufferbloat Explained ends when the hostname on the device matches the hostname in the ticket. If it does not, you are on the wrong box. Stop. A command that succeeded on the wrong box is not progress.
The draft stays a draft until a person has read the names in it. A generator does not log into the device and does not know which interface is the uplink. You delete a line that names a device, a zone, or a prefix you did not write down.
0.0.0.0/0 is not kept because a sample included it. A source you can say is the source you keep. 192.0.2.0/24, 198.51.100.0/24, 203.0.113.0/24, and 2001:db8::/32 are documentation. They belong in the note. They are not prefixes you type onto a production device because they appeared in a draft.
prompt-for-this is a reminder that a secret is missing. It is not a password, a key, a community string, or a pre-shared key you save in the ticket or in git. The real secret stays in the store.
One change is the window. A VLAN and a routing protocol and a VPN do not share it. If two things move and the result is wrong, you will not know which one did it. The next feature waits for its own page.
If the same step fails twice, stop for the day. The failure is the result. Adding a forum command beside a half-applied config produces a device nobody can rebuild. Restore the copy you took first.
A second person reads the device name and the change aloud. If they cannot find them in the ticket, the note is not done. Silence is not agreement. Then leave the device alone.
This page is a planning guide. It is not a vendor manual, not an official standard, and not a permission to touch a network you do not administer. The pillar guide owns the wider design. This page owns one lab proof.
Tools for this guide
These tools run in the browser on this site. They do not log into your machines.
Related pillar guides
More in this cluster
The pillar for this page, and the next published pages filed with it.