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eping
1. Probe mode
2. Stats mode
3. Dot mode
4. MTU mode
5. Parameters
  1. General
  2. IP
  3. ICMP
  4. Probing
  5. Output
6. Requirements
7. Installation
8. Usage
9. Todo/Wishlist
10. About this egg

eping is a Scheme implementation of the ICMP ping utility. Although it can be used like an average OS ping utility, eping is intended to be used programmatically (e.g. for gathering statistics, monitoring). It uses raw sockets thus a privileged account must be used.

[procedure] (eping HOST #!key (mode 'probe)
                              (count #f)
                              (timeout 1000)
                              (interval 1000)
                              (ttl 64)
                              (tos 0)
                              (dont-fragment #f)
                              (src-addr #f)
                              (id #f)
                              (seq-start 0)
                              (size 56)
                              (pattern "")
                              (recv-min #f)
                              (lost-max #f)
                              (cons-recv-min #f)
                              (cons-lost-max #f)
                              (msg1 "%i is alive\n")
                              (msg2 "")
                              (dotcols 0)
                              (quiet #t))

HOST can be either an IPv4 address or a hostname: "192.168.1.1", "example.com", and even 'example.com are all valid hosts.

eping supports four modes of operation: probe (default), stats, dot and mtu.

Probe mode

In this mode eping returns either true or false if it considers an host alive or unreachable respectively. The default behavior is to consider an host alive as soon as an echo reply is received. If no reply is received in count attempts (5 by default), the host is considered unreachable. Probe mode is the default one so it can be omitted as parameter.

(eping "call-cc.org")

===> #t

The aliveness criteria can be changed through the five parameters count, recv-min, lost-max, cons-recv-min, cons-lost-max (see "Parameters" section). As soon as one of these conditions is met eping returns the associated boolean value. If no condition is met in count attempts #f is returned.

In non-quiet 'submode' a message is displayed.

(eping "call-cc.org" quiet: #f)
209.172.49.65 is alive

The output messages can be customized through the msg1 and msg2 parameters.

Stats mode

In stats mode eping returns a vector of statistics #(sent lost rtt-min rtt-avg rtt-max rtt-std). The rtt values are expressed in ms.

(eping "call-cc.org" mode: 'stats)

===> #(5 0 133 134.2 136 0.92)

In non-quiet 'submode' the output resembles a standard ping utility:

(eping "call-cc.org" mode: 'stats quiet: #f)
64 bytes from 209.172.49.65: icmp_seq=0 ttl=52 time=139ms
64 bytes from 209.172.49.65: icmp_seq=1 ttl=52 time=227ms
64 bytes from 209.172.49.65: icmp_seq=2 ttl=52 time=135ms
64 bytes from 209.172.49.65: icmp_seq=3 ttl=52 time=170ms
64 bytes from 209.172.49.65: icmp_seq=4 ttl=52 time=256ms

--- call-cc.org ping statistics ---
5 packets transmitted, 5 packets received, 0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max/stddev = 135.0/185.4/256.0/48.26 ms

Ctrl-\ (SIGQUIT) can be used to print partial statistics without halting the ping (POSIX platforms only). Ctrl-C can be used to stop and collect the statistics at any moment.

By default 5 packets are sent. The count option can be used to change this value (0 meaning non-stop operation).

Dot mode

In this mode eping returns a single character for each echo request:

[.] Echo reply received
[!] No response
[N] Network unreachable
[H] Host unreachable
[P] Protocol unreachable
[F] Packet too big and DF bit set
[A] Administratively filtered
[T] Time to live exceeded
[O] Network/Host unreachable for TOS
[U] Unreachable (generic error)

(eping "call-cc.org" mode: 'dot quiet: #f timeout: 134 count: 20)
..!...!....!.!!!....

The dotcols parameter can be used to set the number of chars to be printed before a newline. The default behavior (0) inserts a newline only after the last echo request.

(eping "call-cc.org mode": 'dot quiet: #f timeout: 134 count: 20 dotcols: 5)
!...!
....!
...!.
!....

In quiet 'submode' a string built from the generated characters is returned.

(eping "call-cc.org" mode: 'dot count: 3)

===> "..."

MTU mode

In mtu mode eping attempts to discover the MTU along the path. To speed up the process it is advisable to lower the default 1000ms echo requests interval time (interval option).

(eping "call-cc.org" mode: 'mtu interval: 250)

===> 1492

Lossy links may slow down or even prevent the convergence. The count option can be used to increase the number of attempts (default is 64). If the mtu can't be computed #f is returned.

Parameters

General

count The number of echo requests to be sent. The default is 5 for modes other than mtu and 64 for mtu mode. If set to 0 echo requests are sent until a probe condition is met (probe mode), mtu is computed (mtu mode) or SIGINT (Ctrl-C) is received (all modes).
timeout The amount of time in ms to let pass before considering an host unreachable (default is 1000ms).
interval The interval in ms between echo requests (default is 1000ms). This value can't be set lower than timeout (this rule is enforced lowering timeout in case).

IP

ttl / tos Respectively the Time To Live and TOS in the IP header.
dont-fragment Sets the Don't Fragment (DF) flag in the IP header.
src-addr Binds the ICMP socket to a specific IP address.

ICMP

size The ICMP payload size.
pattern A string used to fill the payload (repeated if necessary).
id The Identifier field (0-65535). By default it is generated randomly for every invocation of the eping function.
seq-start The initial sequence of the echo requests (0 by default).

Probing

recv-min Minimum number of received replies before considering an host alive.
lost-max Maximum number of missed replies before considering an host unreachable.
cons-recv-min Minimum number of consecutive received replies before considering an host alive.
cons-lost-max Maximum number of consecutive missed replies before considering an host unreachable.

Output

msg1 The message displayed when an host is considered alive. The default message is "%i is alive\n" where %i is expanded to the IP address of the host. Similarly %h is interpreted as the hostname.
msg2 The message displayed when an host is considered unreachable. By default it is an empty string.
dotcols In dot mode the number of displayed chars before a newline is inserted. By default (0) a newline is inserted only after the last displayed char.
quiet By default eping doesn't display anything unless this option is set to #f.

Requirements

socket (>= 0.2.4)

Installation

$ chicken-install eping

A command-line application is also available:

$ chicken-install -r eping
$ cd eping/app
$ make
$ ./eping
eping HOST [-mode probe|stats|dot|mtu]
           [-count COUNT]
           [-interval INTERVAL]
           [-timeout TIMEOUT]
           [-ttl TTL]
           [-tos TOS]
           [-src-addr IP]
           [-dont-fragment]
           [-id ID]
           [-seq-start SEQ]
           [-size SIZE]
           [-pattern PATTERN]
           [-recv-min RMIN]
           [-lost-max LMAX]
           [-cons-recv-min CRMIN]
           [-cons-lost-max CLMAX]
           [-msg1 MSG1]
           [-msg2 MSG2]
           [-dotcols COLS]
           [-quiet]
           [-version]

Usage

(use eping)

Todo/Wishlist

hop count mode
pattern matching
traceroute mode?
tcp/udp support?
ipv6?

About this egg

The source code is hosted at Bitbucket. Feel free to send pull requests or open an issue there. Alternatively, send an e-mail to the chicken-users mailing list for information or requests.

Version History

1.0: Initial release

Author

Michele La Monaca

License

Copyright (c) 2013
Michele La Monaca (eping@lamonaca.net)
All rights reserved.

Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are
met:

1) Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.

2) Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.

3) Neither the name of the author nor the names of its contributors
may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software
without specific prior written permission.

THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS
"AS IS" AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT
LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS
FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE
COPYRIGHT HOLDERS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT,
INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES
(INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR
SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION)
HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT,
STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE)
ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED
OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.