1bwping(8) System Manager's Manual bwping(8)
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6 bwping and bwping6 are tools to measure bandwidth and response times
7 between two hosts using Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP) echo
8 request/echo reply mechanism.
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11 bwping [ -4 | -6 ] [ -B bind_addr ] [ -I ident ] [ -T tos(v4) |
12 traf_class(v6) ] [ -r reporting_period ] [ -u buf_size ] -b kbps -s
13 pkt_size -v volume target
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15 bwping6 [ -4 | -6 ] [ -B bind_addr ] [ -I ident ] [ -T tos(v4) |
16 traf_class(v6) ] [ -r reporting_period ] [ -u buf_size ] -b kbps -s
17 pkt_size -v volume target
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20 -4 Forces IPv4 mode. Default mode of operation is IPv4 for bwping and
21 IPv6 for bwping6 otherwise.
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23 -6 Forces IPv6 mode. Default mode of operation is IPv4 for bwping and
24 IPv6 for bwping6 otherwise.
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26 -B bind_addr
27 Sets the source address of outgoing ip packets. By default the ad‐
28 dress of the outgoing interface will be used.
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30 -I ident
31 Sets the Identifier value of outgoing ICMP Echo Request packets.
32 If zero, the value of the lower 16 bits of the process ID will be
33 used (default).
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35 -T tos(v4) | traf_class(v6)
36 Sets the TOS (in IPv4 mode) or Traffic Class (in IPv6 mode) value
37 of outgoing ip packets. Default value is zero.
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39 -r reporting_period
40 Sets the interval time in seconds between periodic bandwidth, RTT,
41 and loss reports. If zero, there will be no periodic reports (de‐
42 fault).
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44 -u buf_size
45 Sets the size of the socket send/receive buffer in bytes. If zero
46 (default), the system default will be used. Tune this parameter if
47 the speed measurement results are unexpectedly low or packet loss
48 occurs.
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50 -b kbps
51 Sets the transfer speed in kilobits per second.
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53 -s pkt_size
54 Sets the size of ICMP packet (excluding IPv4/IPv6 header) in
55 bytes.
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57 -v volume
58 Sets the volume to transfer in bytes.
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61 Oleg Derevenetz <oleg.derevenetz@gmail.com>
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64 None known.
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67 These tools use raw sockets to deal with ICMP messages, so they may re‐
68 quire root privileges or extended capabilities (such as CAP_NET_RAW on
69 Linux) to run. They can also be run as setuid root.
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71 Although bwping and bwping6 does not require any special software on
72 the remote host (only the ability to respond on ICMP echo request mes‐
73 sages), there are some special requirements to network infrastructure,
74 local and remote host performance:
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76 1. There should be no ICMP echo request/reply filtering on the network.
77 This includes QoS mechanisms (which often affects ICMP) at any point in
78 the testing path;
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80 2. Local host should have enough CPU resources to send ICMP echo re‐
81 quest messages with given rate, and remote host should quickly respond
82 on these messages and should have no ICMP bandwidth limiting turned on.
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84 3. Each bwping and bwping6 process should use its own ICMP Echo Request
85 Identifier value to reliably distinguish between ICMP Echo Reply pack‐
86 ets destined for each of these processes.
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88 If some of these requirements are not satisfied then the measurement
89 results will be inadequate or fail completely. In general, for testing
90 bandwidth where QoS is implemented, always test with traffic that
91 matches the QoS class to be tested.
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94 netstat(1), ping(8)
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98 bwping(8)