delay element of the meter version is the bucket of the queue version; the bucket of the meter version is the process that services the queue, and the leak is such that the emission interval is the same as the tick interval. Therefore for fixed length packets, the implementation of the leaky bucket as a queue is of a special case of a traffic shaping function using a leaky bucket (or token bucket) as a meter in which the limit value, τ, is zero and the process of testing conformance is performed at the lowest possible rate. The leaky bucket as a queue for variable packet lengths can also be described as equivalent to a special case of the leaky bucket as a meter. The suggested implementation can, like the fixed length implementation, be seen as traffic shaping function in which the queue is a delay element, rather than the bucket, and the function that services the queue is, in this case, explicitly given as a token bucket: it is decremented for conforming packets and incremented at a fixed rate. Hence, as the leaky bucket as a meter and token bucket are equivalent, the leaky bucket as a queue for variable packet lengths is also a special case of a traffic shaping function using a leaky bucket (or token bucket) as a meter. There is an interesting consequence of seeing the leaky bucket as a queue for variable packet lengths as a specific implementation of the token bucket or leaky bucket as a meter in traffic shaping. This is that the bucket of the meter has a depth, n, and, as is always the case with the token bucket, this depth determines the burstiness of the output traffic (perhaps in relation to the average or minimum number of tokens required by the packets). Hence, it is possible to quantify the burstiness of the output of this "byte counting" leaky bucket as a meter, unless all packets are of the maximum length when it becomes pointless. However, this ability to define a burstiness for the output is in direct contradiction to the statement that the leaky bucket (as a queue) necessarily gives an output with a rigid rate, no matter how bursty the input. See also Fluid queue Generic cell rate algorithm Token bucket Traffic contract UPC and NPC Notes References Network scheduling algorithms