Networking tools – Little but Effective
Of course you know about lot of networking tools if you are taking preparation for CCNA exam. Actually even if you are not taking preparation for CCNA exam, you can know about many tools for networking. May be few tools are very advanced like Wireshark, may be some tools are not free like SecureCRT. In the same way, there are many tools which are free and simple. Moreover, they are very effective and useful. As a matter of fact, this post is about these types of tools. You will know about five built in tools, which network engineers use everyday!
Ping
Please don’t laugh 😀 Yes I know this is the most common command we use in networking world! But its a tool itself! PING stands for Packet InterNet Gropper. Actually it sends whole alphabet and numbers to the specified destination IP address. Afterward the destination address returns a response. Usually PING commands send four packets. But we can use -t parameter to send infinite number of packets. If the connection between sender and receiver is okay, then there will be know packet loss. Moreover, PING uses ICMP protocol, not TCP or UDP.
ARP
ARP is another common tool we use everyday. It stands for Address Resolution Protocol. No doubt, what ARP does is it maps MAC addresses with IP addresses. But you can do lot more with ARP commands. Actually you have to use few parameters to use ARP command more effectively. For example, arp -a command will show you arp cache in you computer. This is useful when you change IP address of any network connected device. Moreover, you can delete cache with arp -d command.
Telnet
The next big thing is Telnet. No doubt that you have hear about it. Actually it is more useful when you are not near your network device . According to (fake) Murphy’s law, “Most of the problems occur when you are not near your device.” 😀 If this is the case, then Telnet is your best friend. You can access your network device from any corner of the world using IP address. But these days telnet is not so secure. So you should consider using SSH.
IPCONFIG
At this point we will see another very simple but very handy tool, ipconfig. Basic ipconfig command will give you a list of ip addresses in your different network adapters. On the other hand, ipconfig /all command will give you whole lot of information. You can see ip addresses of all network adapters, DNS server information, your MAC address as well and many more. Moreover you can clear IP address by ipconfig /release command and gain IP address by using ipconfig /renew.
NSLookup
Finally we will see another tool nslookup. With nslookup, you can check ip address of any website. Moreover, you can also change your primary DNS server. In any cas if any website has bad DNS mapping you can clear the cache with this tool. Of course it is very easy to use but its very useful in any case.
BONUS
Wait! I said that we will see five tools, right?? But Here is another tool which worth mentioning. Though it is not build in with windows, you have to download it. It is PuTTY. Actually this tool is very useful in case of Telnet and SSH. Instead of using a boring command prompt you can use clean interface of PuTTY. Go download, install and explore it!
Finally these are the networking tools you need everyday. There are hundreds of networking tool out there. But you can live without these tools. Have a nice day!
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