Is it possible to rate-limit an scp/sftp/rsync/etc transfer from the command-line? ie, manual QoS on a single command?

Question

Specifically, I am looking to rate-limit an scp or sftp session (or other arbitrary network call) in the call itself.

For example, let's say I want to copy 100MB to one server, and 1GB to another. I'd like to be able to run both of these at the same time, but maintain a QoS for "normal" computer usage - somewhat similar to how you can rate-limit bittorrent.

Is there a way to do this without touching the networking hardware?

I'm envisioning something akin to:

magic-qos-tool 'scp file user@host:/path/to/file'

Or..

scp -rate 40kbps file user@host:/path/to/file

score 18 · Answer 1 · answered Apr 02 '10 at 20:49

18

scp has -l, and rsync has --bwlimit.

answered Apr 02 '10 at 20:49

Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams

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that was not an option in the `man` page I checked earlier... looks like it depends on the platform, perhaps? – warren Apr 02 '10 at 20:52
Quite possibly. I have OpenSSH 5.3p1 here. – Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams Apr 02 '10 at 20:55
XenServer 6 has scp with -l option – Brian Boatright May 28 '12 at 21:06
The -l flag in scp doesn't work on Solaris 11. Is there any other option or alternative? – Alchemist Oct 11 '16 at 14:57

score 14 · Accepted Answer · answered Apr 02 '10 at 22:54

14

Yes, there's an application that works exactly like your 'magic-qos-tool', called "trickle".

EXAMPLES
     trickle -u 10 -d 20 ncftp

     Launch ncftp(1) limiting its upload capacity to 10 KB/s, and download ca-
     pacity at 20 KB/s.

answered Apr 02 '10 at 22:54

davr

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thanks, @davr - one wrapper tool vs learning all the options to each is a great improvement :) – warren Apr 08 '10 at 14:51

score 7 · Answer 3 · answered Apr 02 '10 at 20:48

7

Rsync makes this easy on you, it has an option to do this: --bwlimit=KBPS

answered Apr 02 '10 at 20:48

kbyrd

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score 3 · Answer 4 · edited Jan 30 '19 at 03:47

3

sftp has a throttle flag, as of Debian 7 and Ubuntu 12.04 in those distributions:

-l limit
Limits the used bandwidth, specified in Kbit/s.

(Of course that's a lower case L.)

Source: stfp(1)

edited Jan 30 '19 at 03:47

Scott - Слава Україні

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answered Jan 30 '19 at 01:42

Thom Luxford

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Is it possible to rate-limit an scp/sftp/rsync/etc transfer from the command-line? ie, manual QoS on a single command?

4 Answers4