******************* PINGING FOR DUMMIES ******************* -=[ESQ]=- Intro: ====== have you ever played a multiplayer game with a crappy modem and wondered why you kept getting "ping timed out"??? there's a little fun program in your windows folder which does all the pinging for you... and it's called ping (ooooo, aaaaahhhhh). it's a dos prog which slows down other computers to let you into the mainstream of things. take the internet for example. before you are connected, there are millions of other people on the internet already who are all using up room, they can only use so much room because the world isn't made out of money... so when you connect, their entitled space gets a little smaller, which slows you down. it's the same with multiplayer games, your computer may seem alot faster when you are in a server with one person, but when you enter a server with 20 people, depending on your computer stats, it may seem slow and choppy. i'm here to show you how to take advantage of pinging. How Do I Take Advantage Of Pinging?: ==================================== what i mean by "taking advantage of pinging" is pinging someone to death, or slowing someone down so bad that they crash or don't perform the same. doesn't that sound fun? naturally you can ping anything to death if it has an IP (xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx) or an ISP (blah.blah.net) the stuff in the brackets for the IPs are numbers, and in the ISPs, the blahs or usually words and the ending isn't always .net... it's sometimes .com or .org. so if your looking for revenge on someone who's connected, get there ip or isp. once you have this information you might want to write it down because it's sometimes hard to remember all of it. now, once it's written down, open up MS DOS Prompt. you know DOS, the black background with a crappy white font. it should look like this: C:\>_ Now the pinging program is in the windows folder, so type [cd windows] now it should look like this... C:\WINDOWS>_ just type [ping] and that will start the program. once it's started it will show the usage, and the options that you can do with it. looking like this: C:\WINDOWS>ping Usage: ping [-t] [-a] [-n count] [-l size] [-f] [-i TTL] [-v TOS] [-r count] [-s count] [[-j host-list] | [-k host-list]] [-w timeout] destination-list Options: -t Ping the specified host until stopped. To see statistics and continue -type Control-Break; To stop - type Control-C. -a Resolve addresses to hostnames. -n count Number of echo requests to send. -l size Send buffer size. -f Set Don't Fragment flag in packet. -i TTL Time To Live. -v TOS Type Of Service. -r count Record route for count hops. -s count Timestamp for count hops. -j host-list Loose source route along host-list. -k host-list Strict source route along host-list. -w timeout Timeout in milliseconds to wait for each reply. C:\WINDOWS>_ You probably have a good idea of whats going on now, but for all those lamers out there you probably don't understand a single thing in the options part. i'm too lazy to explain anymore, so just get your mom to explain things to you. right beside some of the letters you have to put a value, such as count, size, or timeout. those values must be numbers. some have specific boundaries which cannot go lower or higher etc, etc... for instance, the buffer size value must be within 0 and 65500. 65500 being the max, you'd most likely want to use that number. You may have trouble with this, so here's an example of a disliked server that i like picking on... C:/>_ C:/>cd windows C:/WINDOWS> C:/WINDOWS>ping Usage: ping [-t] [-a] [-n count] [-l size] [-f] [-i TTL] [-v TOS] [-r count] [-s count] [[-j host-list] | [-k host-list]] [-w timeout] destination-list Options: -t Ping the specified host until stopped. To see statistics and continue -type Control-Break; To stop - type Control-C. -a Resolve addresses to hostnames. -n count Number of echo requests to send. -l size Send buffer size. -f Set Don't Fragment flag in packet. -i TTL Time To Live. -v TOS Type Of Service. -r count Record route for count hops. -s count Timestamp for count hops. -j host-list Loose source route along host-list. -k host-list Strict source route along host-list. -w timeout Timeout in milliseconds to wait for each reply. C:/WINDOWS> C:/WINDOWS>ping -t -l 65500 -w 10 freedownload.dhs.org *Explanation* the above ping command line says that i want to ping freedownload.dhs.org with max buffer capabilities with 10 millisecond intervals until its dead. Is This The End? ================ you might be thinking, "how do you know when the target's crashed?" or "how do you know if it's working?" once you've entered the ping command line, you will get a response saying: Reply from xxx.xxx.xx.xxx: bytes=xxxxx time=xxxxms TTL=240 the only thing that you should be watching is the time column which should change every response. once the time starts to get higher, you know that it's working and soon it will give a response like: Request timed out. And that's what you want, because it's telling you that you're pinging the server with so much data that it's unable to respond so it's slowing down and it will soon crash. you'll know when it's about to crash when the response turns to: No resources. Just because it says, "no resources." it doesn't mean that you can stop. to crash a server it needs a lot of bruising. and to bruise a server takes a lot of time. pinging a server with the program once is fun, but try running 3 or 4 of the programs at the same time and watch the responses! who knew that DOS could be so much fun? ********** DISCLAIMER ********** Throw a rock up in the air, it's bound to hit someone guilty -=[ESQ]=- Questions or Comments? shoveit@upyour.com