Network Monitoring

[stevep65]

We have been having sporadic networking issues at our new house. We have an AT&T Uverse supplied router and Apple Airport connected to the router as a bridge. I have the following devices connected to the network

• iMac hardwired to the router through a switch
• iPhones and iPads connected wirelessly through the Airport
• AppleTV hardwired to the router
• XBOX ONE hardwired to the router

Every 5 to 15 minutes (not consistent) or so we would loose the ability to browse the internet for about 1-2 miutes on all devices. Typical problems are:

• Google won't load
• Facebook won't load
• YouTube buffering issues
• etc

Each time I call the AT&T we go to speedtest or some other site and we are getting the correct up/down numbers based on our level of service so AT&T says we're good. I would like to start monitoring the network for the following from the iMac for

• Ping
• DNS Lookup
• Speed
• etc

So that I can go back to AT&T with numbers. Are there any applications, scripts, etc available that can help me track these issues using my iMac?

Thanks for any help or guidance you can give me in this matter.

Steve

 

[chscag]

You never mentioned which version of OS X you're running? As that makes a difference in my suggestion to you....

I'm going to assume you're running Yosemite (since it's the latest version of OS X).

Open your Finder and go to:

Macintosh HD/System/Library/CoreServices/Applications

You'll see an application located there named "Network Utility.app" Right click on it and select "make alias". Move the alias that you made to your Applications folder so that it's easily accessible. Now all you need to do is double click this app to open it. From there it has all the info you need (select the correct tab).

Make sure you use the correct path above as I indicated in order to find this application which Apple has hidden for some unknown reason.

 

[stevep65]

Chacag - I've been out of town but thank you for the quick reply back.

I am using Yosemite as you guessed. I have no problem using the Network Utility App. The problem with the Network Utility is that once I get it loaded and start pinging servers the network problem has already corrected itself. I am also not always near my desktop to get this started.

What I was hoping to find is a utility or script that will continuously poll the network to determine it's current status, without my intervention.

Any suggestions?

 

[lclev]

If you want in depth Wireshark will provide you with a continual stream of what is going across your network. It can be a a lot of data but you will see what is happening on your network.

https://www.wireshark.org/download.html

You have to install X-11 first to get it running. I am running version 2.7.7

https://xquartz.macosforge.org/trac

Some people have had trouble getting it to work with Yosemite but I have it running on two different macs with no issues. It does take a while to load giving you the idea it isn't working but it will eventually open and all you do is select your computers WiFi or Ethernet connection and click start.

It may be more than you want or need but you will see what is going on.

Lisa

 

[stevep65]

Lisa,

Thanks, I was able to load and look at Wireshark. Wire Shark seems to be sniffer more than a network connectivity analyzer.

You're right there is a lot more there than what I could need or understand. Could you point me to the best location in the help pages that provides some examples on how to test internet connectivity?

All I want to do is test when en0: runs into an issue making a connection to the internet. I don't need all of the packets, yet.

Steve