Kermit: see and control the devices using your home network

Kermit, a research project from Georgia Tech, lets home broadband users view and control the use of bandwidth on their home networks, showing which devices are using the network and allowing customers to throttle devices that are clobbering their other connections. It also reports on ISP shenanigans, such as bandwidth shaping, and tells you whether you're getting the speeds your ISP advertised.

To make them easier to sort out, Kermit provides a visual display of every device using the home network at any given moment, and it logs usage and total bandwidth over time. It also shows how much bandwidth the connection is delivering. The tool is designed for at-a-glance simplicity, and slapping bandwidth or time limits on any given device is just a click away (prioritizing devices is also an option). To make this dashboard view even simpler, users can rename any object ("My Xbox," "Janie's iPhone") and can display a picture of the device.

Parents, need to throttle Timmy's Xbox while you work from home?

Kermit Research Paper (PDF)