1PING(8)                             iputils                            PING(8)
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NAME

6       ping - send ICMP ECHO_REQUEST to network hosts
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SYNOPSIS

9       ping [-aAbBdDfhLnOqrRUvV46] [-c count] [-F flowlabel] [-i interval]
10            [-I interface] [-l preload] [-m mark] [-M pmtudisc_option]
11            [-N nodeinfo_option] [-w deadline] [-W timeout] [-p pattern]
12            [-Q tos] [-s packetsize] [-S sndbuf] [-t ttl]
13            [-T timestamp option] [hop...] {destination}
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DESCRIPTION

16       ping uses the ICMP protocol's mandatory ECHO_REQUEST datagram to elicit
17       an ICMP ECHO_RESPONSE from a host or gateway. ECHO_REQUEST datagrams
18       (“pings”) have an IP and ICMP header, followed by a struct timeval and
19       then an arbitrary number of “pad” bytes used to fill out the packet.
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21       ping works with both IPv4 and IPv6. Using only one of them explicitly
22       can be enforced by specifying -4 or -6.
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24       ping can also send IPv6 Node Information Queries (RFC4620).
25       Intermediate hops may not be allowed, because IPv6 source routing was
26       deprecated (RFC5095).
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OPTIONS

29       -4
30           Use IPv4 only.
31
32       -6
33           Use IPv6 only.
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35       -a
36           Audible ping.
37
38       -A
39           Adaptive ping. Interpacket interval adapts to round-trip time, so
40           that effectively not more than one (or more, if preload is set)
41           unanswered probe is present in the network. Minimal interval is
42           200msec unless super-user. On networks with low RTT this mode is
43           essentially equivalent to flood mode.
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45       -b
46           Allow pinging a broadcast address.
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48       -B
49           Do not allow ping to change source address of probes. The address
50           is bound to one selected when ping starts.
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52       -c count
53           Stop after sending count ECHO_REQUEST packets. With deadline
54           option, ping waits for count ECHO_REPLY packets, until the timeout
55           expires.
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57       -d
58           Set the SO_DEBUG option on the socket being used. Essentially, this
59           socket option is not used by Linux kernel.
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61       -D
62           Print timestamp (unix time + microseconds as in gettimeofday)
63           before each line.
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65       -f
66           Flood ping. For every ECHO_REQUEST sent a period “.” is printed,
67           while for every ECHO_REPLY received a backspace is printed. This
68           provides a rapid display of how many packets are being dropped. If
69           interval is not given, it sets interval to zero and outputs packets
70           as fast as they come back or one hundred times per second,
71           whichever is more. Only the super-user may use this option with
72           zero interval.