MTR (My traceroute) allows you to constantly poll a remote server. This diagnostic tool combines the ‘traceroute’ and ‘ping’ function. It represents an evolution of the traceroute command by providing a greater data sample, as if augmenting traceroute with ping output, and is useful for seeing how a server’s latency and performance changes over time.
Running a traceroute is different for each Operating System. Here are the steps for Windows, Mac OS and Linux:
To install MTR on Windows:
- Download the latest version of WinMTR.
- You will have a .zip file containing two folders: WinMTR-32 and WinMTR-64
- Each folder contains two files: WinMTR.exe and README.txt
- Extract the WinMTR.exe that corresponds to your platform (32 or 64 bit) and run the file.
To run WinMTR on Windows:
- Start WinMTR. Write the name or IP of the host (e.g. my.websquad.co.za or 160.119.233.4)
- Press the Options button to configure ping size, maximum hops and ping interval (the defaults are OK).
- Push the Start button and wait.
- Copy or export the results in text or HTML format.
- The results should look similar to this:
|------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| WinMTR statistics |
| Host - % | Sent | Recv | Best | Avrg | Wrst | Last |
|------------------------------------------------|------|------|------|------|------|------|
| 172.16.104.1 - 0 | 11 | 11 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| websquad-access.jb1.za.ws.net.za - 0 | 11 | 11 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| core.as-01.jb1.za.ws.net.za - 0 | 11 | 11 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| core.cr-01.db1.za.ws.net.za - 0 | 11 | 11 | 7 | 7 | 8 | 8 |
| core.as-01.db1.za.ws.net.za - 0 | 11 | 11 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 8 |
| 160.119.233.4 - 0 | 11 | 11 | 8 | 8 | 9 | 8 |
|________________________________________________|______|______|______|______|______|______|
Click on Clear History in the drop-down menu to remove the hosts you have previously traced.
To run WinMTR from Windows command:
- Copy the WinMTR.exe file in Windows/System32 so that it’s accessible via the command line -- cmd.
-
Run winmtr -help to see the options available.
-
Run winmtr hostname (e.g. websquad.co.za).
To install MTR on Debian and Ubuntu:
Issue the following commands to ensure that your system’s package repository is up to date, that all installed packages are up to date, and finally to install MTR itself:
apt-get update
apt-get upgrade
apt-get install mtr-tiny
CentOS and Fedora:
Issue the following commands to update repositories, upgrade installed packages, and install the MTR program:
yum update
yum install mtr
Arch Linux systems:
Issue the following commands to update the package database and install MTR:
pacman -Sy
pacman -S mtr
To run an MTR on Linux:
Once installed, call it in the shell using your terminal emulator by typing ‘mtr’ followed by the name of the host. mtr websquad.co.za
