If I don't have a valid servername, will it default to the localhost? I didn't see anything about that in the Net-Ping-2.31 doc. . . .

Ok, pingecho() is a deprecated back-compat wrapper for the ping method of Net::Ping. Running perldoc -m Net::Ping shows that ping returns an empty list if no $host is given. The default I mentioned was pure speculation. I don't see any way that an empty host string will return true, unless your inet_aton does so for empty argument.

Try distinguishing between undef and 0 as return values for pingecho. It is supposed to return undef for an unresolved host and 0 for an unreachable one. That will help you diagnose the problem.

How about just skipping the ping if the host string is not true?

if ($host) {
    if (pingecho($host,$timeout)) {
    #...
    }
}
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After Compline,
Zaxo

Thanks Both:

I've been trying your suggestion and different variations on it, and am not having much luck.

In the office, with high-speed connectivity, it generally seems to work as long as the $timeout value is high enough (something above 20), but not always. Sometimes, the ping just seems to die, with no return to the program. (In the office, a stand-alone ping usually shows about 10 ms turnaround.)

Working at home, with 56 kbps dial-up, it has died every time so far. But, here, the stand-alone ping is about 160 - 180 ms. I then raised the $timeout value to 900, but it still died within the ping. The code, results and stand-alone ping are shown below.

Is there something better than ping for determining connectivity to a remote host? As always, your help and insights are very much appreciated!!

use Net::Ping;

    # Global variables
my $timeout = 90;            # Time to wait for a response from ping


# Part of sub --

    printf "DB Server to be tested for accessibility: $dbSrvrBox\n\n";

    # Ensure the connection to the DB Server is available
        if (!$dbSrvrBox)  {
            printf  ("Cannot find a boxname value in \"$_\" - Will abe
+nd.\n\n");  # 2
            };
        next if (!$dbSrvrBox);

        printf "Ready to ping $dbSrvrBox\n\n";

        if (ping($dbSrvrBox, $timeout)) {
            printf   "DB Server ($dbSrvrBox) is accessible at startup.
+\n\n";
            &msgLog ("DB Server ($dbSrvrBox) is accessible at startup.
+\n");
            }
        else  {
            printf  ("Cannot access $dbSrvrBox - abending.\n\n");     
+   # 3
           };

    printf "After ping\n";

RESULTS (DOS Cmd window) --

DBSERVER0: \\PLYSDEV03\DEV03-
DB Server to be tested for accessibility: PLYSDEV03

Ready to ping PLYSDEV03


C:\A_DRS_Proj\PerlCoding>


STAND-ALONE PING --

C:\A_DRS_Proj\PerlCoding>ping  PLYSDEV03

Pinging PLYSDEV03 [ ip ] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from [ ip ]: bytes=32 time=180ms TTL=125
Reply from [ ip ]: bytes=32 time=160ms TTL=125
Reply from [ ip ]: bytes=32 time=160ms TTL=125
Reply from [ ip ]: bytes=32 time=170ms TTL=125

Ping statistics for [ ip ]:
    Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
    Minimum = 160ms, Maximum =  180ms, Average =  167ms

C:\A_DRS_Proj\PerlCoding>
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