So what is Traffic Shaping/Prioritisation?

It's a contentious subject that can bring out the fire in the quietest of people - or it can make people go "uh?"

So what is traffic shaping or prioritisation - and what does it mean for the average user? What, in fact, does it mean for any user?

The Basics
Traffic Prioritisation (which we'll just call shaping from now on 'cos it's easier to type ) looks at what type of information is going through the network and then ranks it according to how PlusNet have configured it. It looks at each packet of information and if it sees that the data is for someones PlusTalk telephone call, it will give it the highest priority so that there are no delays in your phone conversation. On the flip-side, if you are downloading a huge file using Peer 2 Peer (P2P such as BitTorrent), the network will see this and then put it at a lower priority as it isn't a time-sensitive piece of data (you won't really notice if it takes a little bit longer for that data to arrive - but you'd certainly notice it if your phone calls broke up waiting for the voice to travel the network)

So what is shaped, when and by how much?

There are 3 levels of priorities in use on the PlusNet network - Gold, Silver and Bronze. The table below gives a rough guide of what priority the main applications are given.