The other day, while researching the problem yet again, I ran across a reference to Matt's traceroute ("MTR"), which claims to combine the features of traceroute and ping. In one of the threads I was reading, someone claimed that it worked in situations where traceroute did not. I thought I'd give it a shot, so I downloaded the 0.51 source [86K download] and expanded the archive.
I successfully compiled the program by simply typing:
% cd /path/to/mtr-0.51/The whole process took about two minutes, and when it was done, I had a useful tool that worked just fine from behind my Linksys. By combining ping and traceroute, you get a real-time output that shows exactly where the hang-ups in a given connection may be. There are also a number of output display options (press "D" to cycle between them), and mtr includes a very good 'man' page as well. It seems like a good tool to me, and it (finally!) gives me back my traceroute abilities.
% ./configure --bindir=/usr/local/bin
--mandir=/usr/local/share/man
% make
% sudo make install
% rehash
[Editor's note: Hey, wait, I don't need an editor's note! I actually wrote this one! See, I do know how to use OS X! ;-)]
![]() Panther broken! |


