Ping, Traceroute, and Whois Help
Ping help | Traceroute
help | Whois help
Ping help
Ping is a network utility that lets you see if another computer
can be reached through the Internet. If you are having troubles
accessing a particular web page, for example, but not others,
you might try pinging it to see if it responds.
Here's what a typical ping session to the popular search engine
Yahoo! (www.yahoo.com) might
look like:
Please wait for script to run, or time
out
RESULTS OF /bin/ping -c 5 on www.yahoo.com
PING www.yahoo.com (204.71.200.74):
56 data bytes
64 bytes from 204.71.200.74: icmp_seq=0 ttl=251 time=198.7 ms
64 bytes from 204.71.200.74: icmp_seq=1 ttl=251 time=44.9 ms
64 bytes from 204.71.200.74: icmp_seq=2 ttl=251 time=200.5 ms
64 bytes from 204.71.200.74: icmp_seq=3 ttl=251 time=295.7 ms
64 bytes from 204.71.200.74: icmp_seq=4 ttl=251 time=225.8 ms
--- www.yahoo.com ping statistics ---
5 packets transmitted, 5 packets received, 0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max = 44.9/193.1/295.7 ms
It's not as complicated as it looks. Most of the information
isn't too interesting unless you're a network engineer. However,
the last three lines, the lines that give the 'ping statistics',
are pretty useful.
Ping sends 5 small bits of information, called packets, to the
other computer, and the other computer tries to send them back.
In the case above, all five packets made the round-trip to and
from Yahoo! correctly. 5 packets were transmitted to Yahoo!, and
all 5 were returned to Northcoast Internet. No packets got lost
or destroyed during the trip, so there is 0% packet loss. The
final line tells you how fast the packets made the trip, in milliseconds.
In our example above, the fastest packet made the trip in 44.9
ms, the slowest in 295.7 ms, and the average speed was 193.1 ms.
If you don't get all the packets back, you might try a traceroute
to the same address. Traceroute will give you more specific information
on where in the Internet the problem is occuring.
Important: Some large sites (www.microsoft.com, for example)
never return ping requests. This doesn't mean anything
is necessarily wrong. Try opening the same site in a web browser.
If you can open the web page, everything is OK.
Traceroute help
Traceroute is an Internet utility similar to ping.
Traceroute not only tells you whether another computer on the
Internet is responding, but also the route that information takes
from Northcoast Internet's system to that computer.
Here's what a successful traceroute to Humboldt State University
(www.humboldt.edu) might
look like:
Please wait for script to run, or time
out
RESULTS OF /usr/bin/traceroute on www.humboldt.edu
1 core1 (208.25.112.2) 19.045 ms 419.421
ms 3.912 ms
2 sl-gw1-sj-1-4.sprintlink.net (144.228.110.89) 16.537 ms 20.232
ms 21.105 ms
3 sl-bb10-sj-0-2-155M.sprintlink.net (144.232.3.29) 24.060 ms
25.951 ms 36.081 ms
4 sl-bb10-stk-7-0.sprintlink.net (144.232.8.194) 33.928 ms 35.372
ms 21.858 ms
5 sl-bb10-stk-8-0.sprintlink.net (144.232.4.113) 17.691 ms 17.778
ms 19.677 ms
6 sl-gw11-stk-0-0-0.sprintlink.net (144.232.4.82) 43.537 ms 200.254
ms 31.644 ms
7 sl-csuhay-1-0-0-T3.sprintlink.net (144.228.147.14) 29.658 ms
33.550 ms 38.752 ms
8 HUM-HAY-ATM.CSU.net (137.145.202.177) 32.194 ms 45.232 ms 35.632
ms
9 sorrel.humboldt.edu (137.150.148.18) 38.609 ms 36.738 ms 37.167
ms
Each line tells you information about a particular computer
on the route between Northcoast Internet's computer sytem and
the computer you're tracerouting to.
The first number in the line tells you the number of 'hops',
or steps that information takes to reach that computer. Generally
speaking, the less 'hops' your information takes to reach its
destination, the better. If you can't reach the other computer
in 30 hops, traceroute gives up, and it also gives up if you can't
reach the site in 60 seconds.
The next bit of information tells you the computer's name and
Internet address. The last part of the name tells you what computer
network the computer belongs to. For example, in the 7th hop,
the computer ends with 'sprintlink.net'. That's part of Sprint's
Internet backbone. On the 8th hop, the information is travelling
on a different network, CSU.net, which is the California State
University system's Internet network. You can find out who's responsible
for a particular computer network, like CSU.net or sprintlink.net,
using whois.
On the other hand, here's what an unsuccessful traceroute (to
a server for the online game Everquest)
might look like:
Please wait for script to run, or time
out
RESULTS OF /usr/bin/traceroute on eqworld-08.989studios.com
1 core1 (208.25.112.2) 107.191 ms 186.009
ms 19.080 ms
2 sl-gw1-sj-1-4.sprintlink.net (144.228.110.89) 22.962 ms 35.482
ms 20.875 ms
3 sl-bb10-sj-0-2-155M.sprintlink.net (144.232.3.29) 34.581 ms
17.492 ms 21.982 ms
4 sl-bb10-stk-7-0.sprintlink.net (144.232.8.194) 31.373 ms 32.570
ms 20.797 ms
5 sl-bb3-stk-4-0-0.sprintlink.net (144.232.4.14) 21.248 ms 19.631
ms 25.925 ms
6 Hssi8-1-0.BR1.SFO1.ALTER.NET (137.39.166.121) 47.471 ms 43.903
ms 43.296 ms
7 114.ATM2-0.XR2.SFO1.ALTER.NET (146.188.148.222) 70.236 ms 43.396
ms 44.042 ms
8 286.ATM1-0.TR2.SCL1.ALTER.NET (146.188.147.170) 46.267 ms 42.251
ms 44.633 ms
9 107.ATM6-0.TR2.LAX2.ALTER.NET (146.188.137.145) 83.827 ms 82.574
ms 85.921 ms
10 198.ATM7-0.XR2.LAX2.ALTER.NET (146.188.248.133) 298.423 ms
304.531 ms 323.995 ms
11 194.ATM9-0-0.GW1.SDG1.ALTER.NET (146.188.249.69) 334.512 ms
740.838 ms 733.210 ms
12 sonyinteractive-gw.customer.alter.net (157.130.225.134) 287.076
ms 251.620 ms 243.614 ms
13 * * *
14 * * *
15 * * *
Content-type: text/html
Your request exceeded the maximum time
limit...
In this example, the traceroute takes longer than 60 seconds,
and the traceroute program stops trying to reach it. In a traceroute,
the asterisk character (*) indicates a problem. After the 12th
hop in our example traceroute, all that's listed are asterisk
characters. We can assume that there's a communication problem
between the computer listed at hop number 12, sonyinteractive-gw.customer.alter.net,
and the next computer on the route to our goal. If we wanted to
contact the people responsible for that computer about the problem,
we could use whois to find their contact
information.
Important: Some remote computers
can't be reached with traceroute because they block the special
kind of packets traceroute uses. If you can reach the computer
with a web browser, however, everything is working properly.
Whois help
Whois lets you see who is responsible for a particular Internet
domain. A 'domain' is a name that refers to a computer network
owned or controlled by a particular individual, company, or other
group. When you look at a web address or computer name, the last
two parts of the address are its domain name. For example, Northcoast
Internet's web address is www.northcoast.com, and our domain name
is northcoast.com. Apple Computer's web address is www.apple.com,
so their domain name is apple.com.
Here's what a whois looks like for the domain apple.com:
Please wait for script to run, or time out
RESULTS OF /usr/bin/whois on apple.com
[rs.internic.net]
Registrant:
Apple Computer, Inc. (APPLE-DOM)
1 Infinite Loop
Cupertino, CA 95014
Domain Name: APPLE.COM
Administrative Contact:
Zimmerman, David Paul (DPZ) dpz@APPLE.COM
+1 (408) 974-2436 (FAX) +1 (408) 974-3103
Technical Contact, Zone Contact:
Eddings, Kenneth (KE557) eddingsk@APPLE.COM
408 974-4286 (FAX) 408 974-3103
Billing Contact:
Zimmerman, David Paul (DPZ) dpz@APPLE.COM
+1 (408) 974-2436 (FAX) +1 (408) 974-3103
Record last updated on 05-May-98.
Record created on 19-Feb-87.
Database last updated on 24-May-99 08:14:43 EDT.
Domain servers in listed order:
NSERVER.APPLE.COM 17.254.0.50
NSERVER2.APPLE.COM 17.254.0.59
NSERVER.EURO.APPLE.COM 194.151.19.41
NSERVER.ASIA.APPLE.COM 203.120.14.5
You agree that you will not reproduce, sell, transfer, or modify
any of the data presented in response to your search request,
or use of any such data for commercial purpose, without the prior
express written permission of Network Solutions.
We can see that the apple.com domain belongs to Apple Computer,
Inc., and we can see their mailing address. Whois also lists their
administrative, technical, and billing contacts. If you're having
a technical problem reaching a computer on Apple's domain, you
might try emailing or calling their technical contact about it.
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