Packet scheduling is the core component of many recent innovations in optimizing network performance and utilization. Modern networks rely on schedulers in two specific ways: 1) traffic shaping and hierarchical bandwidth sharing at end-hosts, and 2) scheduling in hardware switches.

This course will give a survey of recent developments in the design of flexible scheduling and shaping methods, that are deployed in data centers and wide-area networks. Topics covered include 1) data structures for scheduling and shaping methods, 2) the scheduling architectures of Linux systems and commercial routers, 3) hierarchical bandwidth sharing.

The course will also cover key scheduling techniques, with an emphasis on methods for fair queuing and service-curve based scheduling. Exposure will be given to formal descriptions of traffic control algorithms using concepts of the network calculus.