Open Source Ecosystems

bwping(8) System Manager's Manual bwping(8)

NAME bwping and bwping6 are tools to measure bandwidth and response times between two hosts using Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP) echo request/echo reply mechanism.

SYNOPSIS bwping [ -4 | -6 ] [ -B bind_addr ] [ -I ident ] [ -T tos(v4) | traf_class(v6) ] [ -r reporting_period ] [ -u buf_size ] -b kbps -s pkt_size -v volume target

   bwping6  [  -4  |  -6  ]  [  -B bind_addr ] [ -I ident ] [ -T tos(v4) |
   traf_class(v6) ] [ -r reporting_period ] [ -u buf_size  ]  -b  kbps  -s
   pkt_size -v volume target

OPTIONS -4 Forces IPv4 mode. Default mode of operation is IPv4 for bwping and IPv6 for bwping6 otherwise.

   -6   Forces IPv6 mode. Default mode of operation is IPv4 for bwping and
        IPv6 for bwping6 otherwise.

   -B bind_addr
        Sets  the  source  address  of outgoing ip packets. By default the
        address of the outgoing interface will be used.

   -I ident
        Sets the Identifier value of outgoing ICMP Echo  Request  packets.
        If  zero, the value of the lower 16 bits of the process ID will be
        used (default).

   -T tos(v4) | traf_class(v6)
        Sets the TOS (in IPv4 mode) or Traffic Class (in IPv6 mode)  value
        of outgoing ip packets. Default value is zero.

   -r reporting_period
        Sets the interval time in seconds between periodic bandwidth, RTT,
        and loss reports. If zero,  there  will  be  no  periodic  reports
        (default).

   -u buf_size
        Sets  the size of the socket send/receive buffer in bytes. If zero
        (default), the system default will be used. Tune this parameter if
        the  speed measurement results are unexpectedly low or packet loss
        occurs.

   -b kbps
        Sets the transfer speed in kilobits per second.

   -s pkt_size
        Sets the size of  ICMP  packet  (excluding  IPv4/IPv6  header)  in
        bytes.

   -v volume
        Sets the volume to transfer in bytes.

AUTHORS Oleg Derevenetz [email protected]

BUGS None known.

NOTES These tools use raw sockets to deal with ICMP messages, so they may require root privileges or extended capabilities (such as CAP_NET_RAW on Linux) to run. They can also be run as setuid root.

   Although  bwping  and  bwping6 does not require any special software on
   the remote host (only the ability  to  respond  on  ICMP  echo  request
   messages),   there   are   some   special   requirements   to   network
   infrastructure, local and remote host performance:

   1. There should be no ICMP echo request/reply filtering on the network.
   This includes QoS mechanisms (which often affects ICMP) at any point in
   the testing path;

   2. Local host should have  enough  CPU  resources  to  send  ICMP  echo
   request  messages  with  given  rate,  and  remote  host should quickly
   respond on these messages and should have no  ICMP  bandwidth  limiting
   turned on.

   3. Each bwping and bwping6 process should use its own ICMP Echo Request
   Identifier value  to  reliably  distinguish  between  ICMP  Echo  Reply
   packets destined for each of these processes.

   If  some  of  these requirements are not satisfied then the measurement
   results will be inadequate or fail completely. In general, for  testing
   bandwidth  where  QoS  is  implemented,  always  test with traffic that
   matches the QoS class to be tested.