IT Milk: entry

The following is an email from a network coordinator at Penn State University regarding a) slow internet and b) the bandwidth limit:

During the day it is slower in the residence halls than in the rest of the university. There is a cap on how much traffic the students can possibly use so it doesn’t affect the rest of the university. This has been in place since the restrictions were implemented years ago. When the limits were increased this cap was also increased. More than likely you are experiencing slowness because all the residence hall traffic has hit the limit and everyone slows down until after the university shuts down for the day. Then the cap is changes to allow residence halls to consume more of the available bandwidth purchased for the entire university.

The residence halls make up ~ 12% of the population of Penn State. Not regulated, they will consume every bit of bandwidth purchased for everyone, not just residence hall students. They end up wanting even more than we purchase. Since the limits were imposed people conserve more and are able to stay within those limits and the network speed has returned. Even though it is slow sometimes, it is enough to meet the academic need and some recreational need. If students use it more for recreational need instead of academic, they are using the network for the wrong reason.

I did look at a graph of residence hall traffic the first day of class and the demand far exceeded the available bandwidth. Every fall semester there is a learning curve where people learn there are limits and that they have to reduce how much Internet bandwidth they use. It usually kicks the heavy users off after the first month and everyone else gets used to using the connection for academics and some recreational use. Then the network works well for everyone.