Today we’re happy to announce that we have added ICMP Ping and Traceroute to our Free Tools at mxtoolbox.com. Typically you would use a Windows Command Processor or Terminal shell to utilize Ping and Traceroute to help troubleshoot issues however it is often very useful to run these tools from a location other than where you are currently sitting, so we’ve added it to the arsenal of commands available on our site.
Ping (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ping)
Ping is a commonly used tool to test the reachability of a host (IP) and also measures the round trip time on the response.
| NOTE: Don’t confuse the new ICMP ping tool with our ping@mxtoolbox.com email trace tool. Ping@mxtoolbox.com was created in the spirit of ICMP ping as a quick tool to test Inbound and Outbound mail flow on a server. For more details on ping@mxtoolbox.com, go here. |
Traceroute (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traceroute)
Traceroute tracks the path that a packet takes from the source to a destination address. A traceroute also shows how many times your packets are being rebroadcast by other servers until it gets to the final destination.
Along with our Free DNS Tools, we also offer Free Server Monitoring. Our MxWatch Monitoring will allow you to setup Monitors for Blacklists, SMTP and more. You will then be alerted via email or SMS text if there is an issue with a Monitor, which can help you address problems before they escalate. The Free version of our MxWatch includes two Monitors, which can be used to check the Blacklist every seven days or any other additional alerts of your choice; SMTP, TCP, HTTP, etc. We also offer Paid Services for those individuals that want to monitor more than two sites or servers. Why choose the paid services? The MxWatch Basic package provides up to 10 Monitors as well as access to the Tier II expertise of our rock-star Support Team!
Here is the full list of available commands for our Free DNS Tools:
| Command | Explanation | |
| blacklist: | Check IP or host for reputation | |
| smtp: | Test mail server SMTP (port 25) | |
| mx: | DNS MX records for domain | |
| a: | DNS A record IP address for host name | |
| spf: | Check SPF records on a domain | |
| txt: | Check TXT records on a domain | |
| ptr: | DNS PTR record for host name | |
| cname: | DNS canonical host name to IP address | |
| scan: | Perform a port scan on the host | |
| whois: | Get domain registration information | |
| arin: | Get IP address block information | |
| soa: | Get Start of Authority record for a domain | |
| tcp: | Verify an IP Address allows tcp connections (tcp:ip:port) New! | |
| http: | Verify an IP Address allows http connections (http:”url”:”regex”) New! | |
| https: | Verify an IP Address allows secure connections (https:”url”:”regex”) New! | |
| ping: | Perform a standard ICMP ping New! | |
| trace: | Perform a standard ICMP trace route New! |
As always we thank everyone for their feedback on our tools, to reach out to us please email us at feedback@mxtoolbox.com.