rshaper is a kernel module in Linux that restricts the bandwidth of incoming packets directed to various hosts.
That's because conventional shaper drivers aren't really set up to deal with intricate filtering and routing tasks, especially when trying to address specific situations involving a range of hosts. Even when attempting to address simpler problems, the shaper driver may not be able to help - effective filtering often requires source-routing, which isn't supported by the standard shaper.
This can be a major issue in production environments, particularly if you're working with older versions of Linux like 2.0. In my experience, I wasn't able to use the shaper to address the problem at all - the shaper driver only existed for Linux-2.1, and my setup was constrained to using Linux 2.0.
However, rshaper provided a solution for shaping outgoing traffic that didn't rely on source-routing. While using rshaper with 2.0 and 2.2 requires patching the network driver, the 2.4 "netfilter" feature makes the process much simpler and avoids the need to patch the network driver.
Overall, I'd say that rshaper is a powerful tool that can help you manage bandwidth and optimize network performance. If you're having trouble with the limitations of conventional shaper drivers, give rshaper a try and see what it can do for you.
Version 2.01: N/A