PING stands for Packet Inter Network Groper and means “to get the attention of” or “to check for the presence of” another party online.
The ping command is a very common method for troubleshooting the accessibility of devices. It uses a series of Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP) Echo messages to determine:
- Whether a remote host is active or inactive.
- The round-trip delay in communicating with the host.
- Packet loss.
The ping command first sends an echo request packet to an address, then waits for a reply. The ping is successful only if:
- the echo request gets to the destination, and
- the destination is able to get an echo reply back to the source within a predetermined time called a timeout. The default value of this timeout is two seconds.
SYNTAX :
ping [-t] [-a] [-n count] [-l size] [-f] [-i TTL] [-v TOS] [-r count] [-s count] [[-j host-list] | [-k host-list]] [-w timeout] [-R] [-S srcaddr] [-4] [-6] target_name
EXAMPLE : Go to command prompt and type command in below syntax and hit enter
ping 74.125.200.101
This command will send four packets to the target IP address and recieve four packets as a reply on success, showing the presence and availabilty of device/machine with target IP address.
For more help on ping you can type ping /? in command prompt to see switches available with ping commands and there meanings.
