Last Updated on May 28, 2022
In operation
Here’s an image of Pingnoo in action.
What does Pingnoo do? The software sends repeated ICMP (Internet Control Message Protocol) packets and increments the time-to-live (TTL) field. As the packet passes through routers (shown as hops) the TTL field is decremented, if the value reaches zero then the router that is currently processing that packet will usually respond with a time exceeded message to the originating host.
Pingnoo tracks all ICMP packets it transmits and is able to pair ICMP responses with the sent requests, this allows the round-trip-time (RTT) to be calculated not only between the two endpoints, but also the intermediate hops between the hosts.
This information is plotted with graphs to provide an instant visual overview of a route and can be used to identify network issues, not just locally but at any point between the originating computer and the target.
The software is extensible and offers built-in support to redact host name and IP addresses which is useful if you wish to share the plots but at the same time hide sensitive information.
There’s support for IPv4 and IPv6. We can change the interval, and the duration of the viewport. For the latter, the default is 60 seconds, but there’s also durations of 10 minutes, 15 minutes, 30 minutes, 45 minutes, 1 hour, 12 hours, and 24 hours.
Next page: Page 3 – In Operation
Pages in this article:
Page 1 – Introduction / Installation
Page 2 – In Operation
Page 3 – Summary
Complete list of articles in this series:
| Essential System Tools | |
|---|---|
| Alacritty | Innovative, hardware-accelerated terminal emulator |
| BleachBit | System cleaning software. Quick and easy way to service your computer |
| bottom | Graphical process/system monitor for the terminal |
| btop++ | Monitor usage and stats for CPU, memory, disks, network and processes |
| catfish | Versatile file searching software |
| Clonezilla | Partition and disk cloning software |
| CPU-X | System profiler with both a GUI and text-based |
| Czkawka | Find duplicate files, big files, empty files, similar images, and much more |
| ddrescue | Data recovery tool, retrieving data from failing drives as safely as possible |
| dust | More intuitive version of du written in Rust |
| f3 | Detect and fix counterfeit flash storage |
| Fail2ban | Ban hosts that cause multiple authentication errors |
| fdupes | Find or delete duplicate files |
| Firejail | Restrict the running environment of untrusted applications |
| Glances | Cross-platform system monitoring tool written in Python |
| GParted | Resize, copy, and move partitions without data |
| GreenWithEnvy | NVIDIA graphics card utility |
| gtop | System monitoring dashboard |
| gWakeOnLAN | Turn machines on through Wake On LAN |
| hyperfine | Command-line benchmarking tool |
| HyFetch | System information tool written in Python |
| inxi | Command-line system information tool that's a time-saver for everyone |
| journalctl | Query and display messages from the journal |
| kmon | Manage Linux kernel modules with this text-based tool |
| Krusader | Advanced, twin-panel (commander-style) file manager |
| Nmap | Network security tool that builds a "map" of the network |
| nmon | Systems administrator, tuner, and benchmark tool |
| nnn | Portable terminal file manager that's amazingly frugal |
| pet | Simple command-line snippet manager |
| Pingnoo | Graphical representation for traceroute and ping output |
| ps_mem | Accurate reporting of software's memory consumption |
| SMC | Multi-featured system monitor written in Python |
| Timeshift | Reliable system restore tool |
| QDirStat | Qt-based directory statistics |
| QJournalctl | Graphical User Interface for systemd’s journalctl |
| TLP | Must-have tool for anyone running Linux on a notebook |
| Unison | Console and graphical file synchronization software |
| VeraCrypt | Strong disk encryption software |
| Ventoy | Create bootable USB drive for ISO, WIM, IMG, VHD(x), EFI files |
| WTF | Personal information dashboard for your terminal |