tkping8

Usage

Overview

tkping is intended primarily for system administrators and network administrators so that they can see when crucial hosts and other network nodes go down.

tkping is typically left running for days. The user can see all nodes are green meaning that all are OK. After being away from the display for a period of time, the user returns and looks at the display. If any of the nodes are not green, then the user knows that those have either "gone missing" for a short period of time or have rebooted (The color tells the user which). Either way, the user knows to log onto these machines to see what happened or to look into the status of the network/subnet to which the failing machines are connected. Overall, this saves the user time, as there is no reason to check into the health of the machines which remain green.

Details of operation

tkping is a tool that runs under the X Window System to display the status of internet nodes.

tkping displays a grid of node buttons, one for each node being monitored. The name of the node represented by the button is displayed on the face of the button.

This grid can be laid-out automatically by tkping or the layout can be controlled by the user from the command-line or by settings in a control file (See: -rows, -columns).

tkping also supports additional layout control interspersed within the nodes file. (See: <blank>, <message>, and <nextcolumn>.)

At specified intervals, tkping will generate a number of ICMP echo packets (similar to the ping(8) program) and send them to each of the specified nodes. tkping displays the results of its pings by coloring the button associated with the node based on the status of the returned pings.

The grid of buttons supports a couple styles of interaction. The user may select a menu operation affecting all of the nodes, or the user may click on one or more buttons and then select a menu operation which affects only those selected. Finally, a right-click operation on a button is supported. This pops up a list of operations one can do against that specific button.

The button color represents current status of the node. The user can recheck a node, mark it a down, or get info regarding details of the history of ping attempts against this node.

To recheck a node, simply click on the button corresponding to the desired node. The color will change, indicating that the node has been selected. Picking ``Recheck'' from the menu will then check the node again. During the time that a node is being rechecked, the cursor will change to an hourglass. All button and/or keypress events sent to tkping will be ignored until the pinging is complete and the cursor is restored.

If a node is selected and ``Down'' is picked, then the node is marked as ignored and the color of the button is changed to represent this status. When tkping next traverses the grid, this node will not be checked. This is useful when the user knows a node to be down and does not want to waste any time checking it.

If a node is selected and ``Info'' is picked, a pop-up dialog will display statistics about that node. Currently, tkping will print out the total number of times the node returned none, some, or all of the packets sent out, the total number of packets sent to and received from the node, and the average packet round-trip time sampled over the last 5, 50, 100, and 200 grid traversals.

Multiple nodes may be rechecked, or marked as down. If ``Info'' is then picked, only the first node will have its information displayed.

Options

The following are the command-line arguments understood by tkping:

-rows {nbr}

This option is used to specify the number of rows in the host grid. Entries in the node file will then be loaded top to bottom. (Resource name: rows).

-columns {nbr}

This option is used to specify the number of columns in the host grid. Entries in the node file will then be loaded left to right. (Resource name: columns)

-wintitle {titleStr}

Specify the text to put on the application titlebar (as opposed to the window manager's titlebar). (the default is ``tkping'' followed by a version string). (Resource name: wintitle)

-nodes {fspec}

Specify a name of a file which contains the hosts to put on the grid. If this option is given, the default file ~/.tkpingrc will not be loaded. (No associated resource)

-xdefs {fspec}

Name of the file which contains option settings. Use in place of discrete command-line options, an X resources file, or the system-wide defaults file /etc/tkping/tkping.conf. (No associated resource)

-logfile {fspec}

Specifies the log file to which diagnostic output will be sent. ()

-packets {nbr}

Number of packets to send to each node (default 5). (Resource name: numberPackets)

-sleep {secs}

Interval between traversals of the grid (default 120 seconds). (Resource name: sleepDelay)

-timeout {secs}

How long to wait for each packet before assuming the node is not responding (default 0.5 seconds). (Resource name: timeout)

-ignore

In certain circumstances, it may be preferable that tkping not immediately attempt to ping all the nodes on the grid. When this option is set, all nodes will act as though they had been selected and the ``Down'' menu item picked.

-debug

Turn on debugging. Used primarily by developer of tkping.

-verbose

Show more detailed info regarding application state.

-h --help

Show summary of options.

Colors

tkping uses colors to indicate the status of each node. The standard color codes along with the X-default codes are as follows:

#00C000 allPacketsBackColor

Host returned all packets sent.

#DAFF00 somePacketsBackColor

Host returned some of the packets sent.

#C00000 noPacketsBackColor

Host returned none of the packets sent.

Orange ignoredColor

The node is to be ignored.

LightGrey changedColor

The node changed its status from either returning no packets or from an error to returning all packets. The cell will remain in this color or pattern until reset by manually checking the node (see above).

Black errorColor

An internal error has occurred. This should only occur if the host name cannot be found in either the name server or system host table.

white messageTextColor

The text headings for groups of nodes (buttons) should be displayed in this color.

Files

~/.tkpingrc

File containing nodes to check as well as labels to display amongst the node buttons.

/etc/tkping/tkping.conf

File containing settings default values for timeouts, ping counts, etc.

File formats: nodes

To Be Added. See /usr/share/doc/tkping/examples/tkping.hosts for now.