Network-Throttling Control Panel

Ubuntu lacks a control panel to easily throttle outbound/inbound network throughput (by machine and possibly by [registered] application). Throttling network throughput is a useful and sometimes required feature when several machines share a single Internet connection (for example in a school where several children will share an ADSL/dialup connection). E.g., an ubuntu client might be assigned a maximum throughput due to some local policy or s/he might want to join in a home network and download files without affecting other machines downloading real-time video streams. Currently, there is no easy way, using a control panel in network preferences or similar, to do such throttling in ubuntu, either in a router/server or in a client machine setup. There are several available general linux frameworks for implementing such throttling upon (e.g. lartc.org, shorewall.net, netfilter/iptables), but none of them is easy-to-use, requiring considerable command-line digging-up, linux network know-how or other cryptic user interfaces that aren't readily tweakable by the expected average ubuntu end-user.