1. How to Use MTR (Traceroute and Ping Combined)
Posted by purehate in Insights at 5:57 PM
One of the not so well know networking tools available on Linux is MTR. MTR combines
the functionality of the traceroute and ping programs in a single net-work diagnostic tool.
As mtr starts, it investigates the network connection between the host mtr runs on and a
user-specified destination host. After it determines the address of each network hop
between the machines, it sends a sequence ICMP ECHO requests to each one to determine
the quality of the link to each machine. As it does this, it prints running statistics about each
machine. A sudden increase in packet-loss or response time is often an indication of a bad
(or simply overloaded) link. mtr is fairly easy to use once you have a look at the different
options possible:
This shows us the usage flags and options.
So in order to know more about the different flags we will take a look at them now:
OPTIONS
-h help
Print the summary of command line argument options.
-v –version
Print the installed version of mtr.
-r –report
This option puts mtr into report mode. When in this mode, mtr will run for
the number of cycles specified by the -c option, and then print statistics and
exit.
This mode is useful for generating statistics about network quality. Note
that each running instance of mtr generates a significant amount of network
traffic. Using mtr to measure the quality of your network may result in
decreased network performance.
-c COUNT –report-cycles COUNT
Use this option to set the number of pings sent to determine both the machines
on the network and the reliability of those machines. Each cycle lasts one
second.
-s BYTES –psize BYTES

2. PACKETSIZE
These options or a trailing PACKETSIZE on the commandline sets the packet size
used for probing. It is in bytes inclusive IP and ICMP headers
If set to a negative number, every iteration will use a different, random
packetsizeupto that number.
-t –curses
Use this option to force mtr to use the curses based terminal interface (if available).
-n –no-dns
Use this option to force mtr to display numeric IP numbers and not try to
resolve the host names.
-g –gtk
Use this option to force mtr to use the GTK+ based X11 window interface (if
available). GTK+ must have been available on the system when mtr was built
for this to work. See the GTK+ web page at
www DOT gimp DOTorg/gtk/for more information about GTK+.
-p –split
Use this option to set mtr to spit out a format that is suitable for a split-
user interface.
-l –raw
Use this option to tell mtr to use the raw output format. This format is better
suited for archival of the measurement results. It could be parsed to be
presented into any of the other display methods.
-a IP.ADD.RE.SS
–address IP.ADD.RE.SS
Use this option to bind outgoing packets’ socket to specific interface, so
that any packet will be sent through this interface. NOTE that this option
doesn’t apply to DNS requests (which could be and could not be what you want).
-i SECONDS
–interval SECONDS
Use this option to specify the positive number of seconds between ICMP ECHO
requests. The default value for this parameter is one second.
-4
Use IPv4 only.

3. -6
Use IPv6 only.
Ok now we see that we have lots of options to play with here.
Ok back to the terminal we are going to look at a target computer with the -r (report mode)
and -c (count) set to 1
We only care about the first two columns. The first is the name of the nodes along the
route,and the second is the percent of packets that were lost. If we lose packets then the
traceroute must find a new way to get to the destination. Sometimes nodes along our route
will drop these packets. You can see that our query was didnt have any isues until hop #13
where it clearly failed and had to find a new route. Remember just like any traceroute the
first node returned is the closest to your box and the last is farthest away. The next step we
would take is dodo individual whois on the hops which failed in order to determine the
reasons for the packet loss.
If your distribution of choice does not have the MTR program installed or it is not
available with the package manager it can be downloaded from here

4. MTR (software)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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MTR
Developer(s) BitWizard
Initialrelease 1997; 15 yearsago
0.82 / December 2, 2011; 4
Stablerelease
monthsago
Written in C
Operatingsystem Unix-like
Type Network
License GNU General PublicLicenseVersion 2
Website www.bitwizard.nl/mtr/
WinMTR
Developer(s) Appnor
0.92 / January 31, 2011; 14
Stablerelease
monthsago
Written in C
Operatingsystem Windows
Type Network
License GNU General PublicLicenseVersion 2
Website www.winmtr.net

5. MTR (My traceroute, originally called Matt's traceroute) is computer software which
combines the functionality of the traceroute and ping programs in a single network
diagnostic tool.[1]
MTR probes routers on the route path by limiting the number of hops individual packets
may traverse, and listening to responses of their expiry. It will regularly repeat this process,
usually once per second, and keep track of the response times of the hops along the path.
Contents
[hide]
1History
2Fundamentals
3Examples
4WinMTR
5Seealso
6References
7External links
[edit]History
The original MTR (known as Matt's traceroute) program was written by Matt Kimball in
1997. Roger Wolff took over maintenance of MTR (renamed to Mytraceroute) in October
1998.[2]
[edit]Fundamentals
MTR is licensed under the terms of the GNU General Public License (GPL) and it works
under modern Unix-like operating systems. It normally works under the text console, but it
also has an optional GTK+-based graphical interface.
MTR relies on ICMP Time Exceeded (type 11, code 0) packets coming back from routers,
or ICMP Echo Reply packets when the packets have hit their destination host. MTR also
has a UDP mode (invoked with "-u" on the command line or pressing the "u" key in the
curses interface) that sends UDP packets, each with an increasing destination port, toward
the destination host. When the UDP mode is used, MTR relies on ICMP port unreachable
packets (type 3, code 3) when the destination is reached.
MTR also supports IPv6 and works in a similar manner but instead relies on ICMPv6
messages.
The tool is often used for network troubleshooting. By showing a list of routers traversed,
and the average round-trip time as well as packet loss to each router, it allows the user to

6. identify links between two particular routers responsible for certain fractions of the overall
latency or packet loss through the network. This can help identify network over utilization
problems.[3]
[edit]Examples
This example shows MTR running on Linux tracing a route from the host machine
(example.lan) to a web server at Yahoo! (p25.www.re2.yahoo.com) across the Level3
network.
My traceroute [v0.71]
example.lan Sun Mar 25 00:07:50 2007
Packets Pings
Hostname %Loss RcvSnt Last Best Avg Worst
1. example.lan 0% 11 11 1 1 1
2
2. ae-31-51.ebr1.Chicago1.Level3.n 19% 9 11 3 1 7
14
3. ae-1.ebr2.Chicago1.Level3.net 0% 11 11 7 1 7
14
4. ae-2.ebr2.Washington1.Level3.ne 19% 9 11 19 18 23
31
5. ae-1.ebr1.Washington1.Level3.ne 28% 8 11 22 18 24
30
6. ge-3-0-0-53.gar1.Washington1.Le 0% 11 11 18 18 20
36
7. 63.210.29.230 0% 10 10 19 19 19
19
8. t-3-1.bas1.re2.yahoo.com 0% 10 10 19 18 32
106
9. p25.www.re2.yahoo.com 0% 10 10 19 18 19
19
An additional example below shows a recent version of MTR running on FreeBSD. MPLS
labels are displayed by default when the "-e" switch is used on the command line (or the
"u" key is pressed in the curses interface):
My traceroute [v0.82]
dax.prolixium.com (0.0.0.0) Sun Jan
1 12:58:02 2012
Keys: Help Display mode Restart statistics Order of fields quit
Packets
Pings
Host Loss% Snt Last Avg
BestWrstStDev
1. voxel.prolixium.net 0.0% 13 0.4 1.7
0.4 10.4 3.2
2. 0.ae2.tsr1.lga5.us.voxel.net 0.0% 12 10.8 2.9
0.2 10.8 4.3
3. 0.ae59.tsr1.lga3.us.voxel.net 0.0% 12 0.4 1.7
0.4 16.0 4.5

7. 4. rtr.loss.net.internet2.edu 0.0% 12 4.8 7.4
0.3 41.8 15.4
5. 64.57.21.210 0.0% 12 5.4 15.7
5.3 126.7 35.0
6. nox1sumgw1-vl-530-nox-mit.nox.org 0.0% 12 109.5 60.6
23.0 219.5 66.0
[MPLS: Lbl 172832 Exp 0 S 1 TTL 1]
7. nox1sumgw1-peer--207-210-142-234.nox.org 0.0% 12 25.0 23.2
23.0 25.0 0.6
8. B24-RTR-2-BACKBONE-2.MIT.EDU 0.0% 12 23.2 23.4
23.2 24.9 0.5
9. MITNET.TRANTOR.CSAIL.MIT.EDU 0.0% 12 23.4 23.4
23.3 23.5 0.1
10. trantor.helicon.csail.mit.edu 0.0% 12 23.7 25.0
23.5 26.5 1.3
11. zermatt.csail.mit.edu 0.0% 12 23.1 23.1
23.1 23.3 0.1
[edit]WinMTR
WinMTR is an equivalent of mtr for Windows developed by Appnor. Functionally it is
very similar, although it does not actually share any code in common with mtr due to the
major diffences between the *nix and Windows network stacks.[citation needed]
[edit]See also
Free software portal
traceroute
ping
PathPing - a network utility supplied in Windows NT and beyond that combines the
functionality of ping with that of traceroute (or tracert)
[edit]References
1. ^Upstream Provider Woes? Point the Ping of Blame. (enterpriseitplanet.com)
2. ^Cisco router configuration and troubleshooting By Mark Tripod (Google Books)
3. ^Linode Library: Diagnosing Network Issues with MTR
[edit]External links
MTR man page
MTR, BitWizard's MTR page with Unix downloads
WinMTR, the equivalent of MTR for Windows platforms
whatismyip.cc Online Traceroute with GeoIP, uses MTR as backend

8. MTR es un acrónimo de Multi-TrackRecorder y pertenece a la categoría Hardware.
How to use the MTR tool to analyse network problems
This guide outlines how to use the MTR tool to analyse network issues that can cause problems
like radio buffering. This tool is useful for identifying where a problem may be. The output of MTR
should be submitted to us so we can get a better idea of whats causing buffering problems.
What is MTR ?
MTR also known as Matt's traceroute or more recently Mytraceroute is computer software which
combines the functionality of the traceroute and ping programs in a single network diagnostic
tool.
MTR probes routers on the route path by limiting the number of hops individual packets may
traverse, and listening to responses of their expiry. It will regularly repeat this process, usually
once per second, and keep track of the response times of the hops along the path.
Read more about MTR here :http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MTR_(Software)
Download MTR.
Windows :WinMTR - 0.8
Linux (Debain / Ubuntu): MTR or ('sudo aptitude install mtr')
How and when to use MTR.
The MTR tool should be used when you are getting buffering issues on your radio. You can use the
MTR tool to test your connectivity to your radio server. This is done by using the hostname of your
server with us. This is usually cp.internet-radio.com or cp2.internet-radio.com or
shoutcast.internet-radio.com etc... You should run the MTR tool for at least 20 minutes, preferably
longer. Once it has been running for a good amount of time (the longer the better) we need you to
email the output to us at contact@internet-radio.com including your username.
Example of MTR output.
Code:
My traceroute [v0.71]

9. source-host.mydomain.com Sun Mar 25 00:07:50
2007
Keys: Help Display mode Restart statistics Order of fields quit
Packets Pings
Hostname %Loss RcvSnt Last Best Avg Worst
1. hop1.mydomain.com 0% 11 11 1 1 1
2
2. ae-31-51.ebr1.Chicago1.Level3.n 19% 9 11 3 1 7
14
3. ae-1.ebr2.Chicago1.Level3.net 0% 11 11 7 1 7
14
4. ae-2.ebr2.Washington1.Level3.ne 19% 9 11 19 18 23
31
5. ae-1.ebr1.Washington1.Level3.ne 28% 8 11 22 18 24
30
6. ge-3-0-0-53.gar1.Washington1.Le 0% 11 11 18 18 20 36
7. 63.210.29.230 0% 10 10 19 19 19
19
8. t-3-1.bas1.re2.yahoo.com 0% 10 10 19 18 32
106
9. p25.www.re2.yahoo.com 0% 10 10 19 18 19
19