My traceroute, originally named Matt's traceroute (MTR), is a
computer program
A computer program is a sequence or set of instructions in a programming language for a computer to Execution (computing), execute. Computer programs are one component of software, which also includes software documentation, documentation and oth ...
which combines the functions of the
traceroute and
ping programs in one network diagnostic tool.
MTR probes
routers on the route path by limiting the number of
hops
Hops are the flowers (also called seed cones or strobiles) of the hop plant '' Humulus lupulus'', a member of the Cannabaceae family of flowering plants. They are used primarily as a bittering, flavouring, and stability agent in beer, to w ...
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.
History
The original ''Matt's traceroute'' program was written by Matt Kimball in 1997. Roger Wolff took over maintaining MTR (renamed ''My traceroute'') in October 1998.
Fundamentals
MTR is licensed under the terms of the
GNU General Public License
The GNU General Public License (GNU GPL or simply GPL) is a series of widely used free software licenses that guarantee end users the four freedoms to run, study, share, and modify the software. The license was the first copyleft for general ...
(GPL) and works under modern
Unix-like
A Unix-like (sometimes referred to as UN*X or *nix) operating system is one that behaves in a manner similar to a Unix system, although not necessarily conforming to or being certified to any version of the Single UNIX Specification. A Unix-li ...
operating systems. It normally works under the text console, but it also has an optional
GTK+
GTK (formerly GIMP ToolKit and GTK+) is a free and open-source cross-platform widget toolkit for creating graphical user interfaces (GUIs). It is licensed under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License, allowing both free and proprie ...
-based
graphical user interface
The GUI ( "UI" by itself is still usually pronounced . or ), graphical user interface, is a form of user interface that allows users to interact with electronic devices through graphical icons and audio indicator such as primary notation, inste ...
(GUI).
MTR relies on
Internet Control Message Protocol
The Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP) is a supporting protocol in the Internet protocol suite. It is used by network devices, including routers, to send error messages and operational information indicating success or failure when communi ...
(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
User Datagram Protocol
In computer networking, the User Datagram Protocol (UDP) is one of the core communication protocols of the Internet protocol suite used to send messages (transported as datagrams in packets) to other hosts on an Internet Protocol (IP) network. ...
(UDP) mode (invoked with "-u" on the command line or pressing the "u" key in the curses interface) that sends UDP packets, with the
time to live
Time to live (TTL) or hop limit is a mechanism which limits the lifespan or lifetime of data in a computer or network. TTL may be implemented as a counter or timestamp attached to or embedded in the data. Once the prescribed event count or timesp ...
(TTL) field in the IP header increasing by one for each probe sent, 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
Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) is the most recent version of the Internet Protocol (IP), the communication protocol, communications protocol that provides an identification and location system for computers on networks and routes traffic ...
and works in a similar manner but instead relies on
ICMPv6
Internet Control Message Protocol version 6 (ICMPv6) is the implementation of the Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP) for Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6). ICMPv6 is an integral part of IPv6 and performs error reporting and diagnostic func ...
messages.
The tool is often used for network troubleshooting. By showing a list of routers traversed, and the average
round-trip time
In telecommunications, round-trip delay (RTD) or round-trip time (RTT) is the amount of time it takes for a signal to be sent ''plus'' the amount of time it takes for acknowledgement of that signal having been received. This time delay includes p ...
as well as
packet loss
Packet loss occurs when one or more packets of data travelling across a computer network fail to reach their destination. Packet loss is either caused by errors in data transmission, typically across wireless networks, or network congestion.Kur ...
to each router, it allows users to identify links between two given routers responsible for certain fractions of the overall latency or packet loss through the network. This can help identify network overuse problems.
Examples
This example shows MTR running on
Linux
Linux ( or ) is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution, which ...
tracing a route from the host machine (example.lan) to a
web server
A web server is computer software and underlying hardware that accepts requests via HTTP (the network protocol created to distribute web content) or its secure variant HTTPS. A user agent, commonly a web browser or web crawler, initiate ...
at
Yahoo!
Yahoo! (, styled yahoo''!'' in its logo) is an American web services provider. It is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California and operated by the namesake company Yahoo Inc., which is 90% owned by investment funds managed by Apollo Global Man ...
(p25.www.re2.yahoo.com) across the
Level 3 Communications
Level 3 Communications was an American multinational telecommunications and Internet service provider company headquartered in Broomfield, Colorado. It ultimately became a part of CenturyLink (now Lumen Technologies), where Level 3 President ...
network.
My traceroute 0.71 example.lan Sun Mar 25 00:07:50 2007
Packets Pings
Hostname %Loss Rcv Snt 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
FreeBSD is a free and open-source Unix-like operating system descended from the Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD), which was based on Research Unix. The first version of FreeBSD was released in 1993. In 2005, FreeBSD was the most popular ...
.
MPLS
Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS) is a routing technique in telecommunications networks that directs data from one node to the next based on labels rather than network addresses. Whereas network addresses identify endpoints the labels identif ...
labels are displayed by default when the "-e" switch is used on the command line (or the "e" key is pressed in the curses interface):
My traceroute 0.82dax.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 Best Wrst StDev
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
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
PLS: 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
Windows versions
WinMTR is a Windows GUI application functionally equivalent to MTR. It was originally developed by Appnor MSP S.R.L.; it is now maintained by White-Tiger. Although it is very similar, WinMTR shares no common code with MTR.
A console version of MTR does exist for Windows, but it has fewer features than MTR on other platforms.
[Based on: https://github.com/traviscross/mtr/issues/55#issuecomment-264057403]
See also
*
traceroute
*
Ping (networking utility)
ping is a computer network administration software utility used to test the reachability of a host on an Internet Protocol (IP) network. It is available for virtually all operating systems that have networking capability, including most embedde ...
*
PathPing - a network utility supplied in
Windows NT
Windows NT is a proprietary graphical operating system
An operating system (OS) is system software that manages computer hardware, software resources, and provides common services for computer programs.
Time-sharing operating systems sc ...
and beyond that combines the functions of ping with those of traceroute, or tracert
*
Bufferbloat
Bufferbloat is a cause of high latency and jitter in packet-switched networks caused by excess buffering of packets. Bufferbloat can also cause packet delay variation (also known as jitter), as well as reduce the overall network throughput. ...
References
External links
*
MTR manual pageMTR BitWizard's MTR page with Unix downloads
WinMTR the equivalent of MTR for Windows platforms
WinMTR (Redux) fork of WinMTR, maintained by René Schümann aka White-Tiger
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mtr (Software)
Free network-related software
Network analyzers