Re: Is there anything better than Net::Ping ? (need to calculate timeout)

[ybiC]

Possibly related - *nix utility bing - "a point-to-point bandwidth measurement tool (hence the 'b'), based on ping." Available for Debian at http://www.debian.org/Packages/stable/net/bing.html, and I think RedHat.

If you roll your own solution, should probably run several iterations to increase accuracy of answer.

    cheers,
    ybiC

[ybiC]

bing isn't a Perl module, it's a *nix command-line utility. It doesn't exactly answer your question, but might provide relevant info. In my experience, it works fine for slower WAN and dialup links, but is unable to cope with LAN speeds.

Here's an example of bing between 2 hosts on opposite ends of a 256Kbps frame-relay PVC :

mail.here.dom:~# bing mail.there.dom
BING    mail.here.dom (10.20.30.1) and mail.there.dom (10.20.40.1)
        44 and 108 data bytes
1024 bits in 3.925ms: 260892bps, 0.003833ms per bit
1024 bits in 5.011ms: 204350bps, 0.004894ms per bit
1024 bits in 5.666ms: 180727bps, 0.005533ms per bit
1024 bits in 5.637ms: 181657bps, 0.005505ms per bit
1024 bits in 3.650ms: 280548bps, 0.003564ms per bit

--- mail.here.dom ---
bytes   out    in   dup  loss   rtt (ms): min       avg       max
   44    35    35          0%           0.236     0.257     0.399
  108    35    35          0%           0.234     0.239     0.263

--- mail.there.dom ---
bytes   out    in   dup  loss   rtt (ms): min       avg       max
   44    35    35          0%          42.366    44.905    71.570
  108    35    35          0%          46.016    56.398   166.923

--- estimated link characteristics ---
warning: rtt big host1 0.234ms < rtt small host2 0.236ms
estimated throughput 280548bps
minimum delay per packet 39.621ms (11115 bits)

average statistics (experimental) :
packet loss: small 0%, big 0%, total 0%
warning: rtt big host1 0.239ms < rtt small host2 0.257ms
average throughput 89105bps
average delay per packet 42.138ms (11822 bits)
weighted average throughput 89105bps

resetting after 35 samples.
mail.here.dom:~#

Let me know if I can be of any help.
    cheers,
    ybiC