Chapter 3. The Command Line and Tools

Table of Contents

3.1. Index
3.2. Dealing with the Command Line Interface
3.3. Tcpdump, the network packet capture tool
3.4. Tcpdump-x
3.5. Ping
3.6. Traceroute
3.7. Telnet
3.8. Tproxytrace
3.9. Nettest
3.10. SSL connect

3.1. Index

This chapter describes how to access and deal with the Command Line Interface (CLI) and the various troubleshooting tools available on the Steelhead appliances, how to use them and how to interpret the results.

The following tools are described:

  • tcpdump, the network packet capture tool.

  • tcpdump-x, a wrapper around tcpdump.

  • ping and ping6, to determine the reachability of a remote host.

  • traceroute and traceroute6, to determine the path to a remote host.

  • telnet, to setup a TCP connection.

  • tproxytrace, to detect Steelhead appliances in the network.

  • Nettest, the internal network testing tools.

  • ssl-connect, to setup an SSL encrypted TCP connection.

3.1.1. Introduction

The Steelhead appliance comes with a large set of built-in tools to investigate network related issues interfering with the setup and the operation of optimized TCP sessions. Knowing how to use them and what to expect in the output will reduce the time needed to finalize installations and identify operational issues.

Note: most of the tools use Linux specific options. Some of the tools use a different naming for the options on other operating systems such as FreeBSD and Microsoft Windows. See the "man" pages or the help section of these other operating systems to find the right options.

3.1.2. Network diagram

Most of the scenarios, logging and traces are obtained from the following network:

Figure 3.1. The network diagram

                              .-,(  ),-.    
                           .-(          )-. 
                     .--- (       WAN      ) ------.
                     |     '-(          ).-'       |
                     |         '-.( ).-'           |
                     |                             |
                     v                             v
                __________                     __________ 
               [_...__...*]                   [_...__...*]
                  Router                         Router
                    |                              |
                    |                              |
                    v                              v
                __________                     __________ 
               [    W     ]                   [    W     ]
               [    L  P  ]                   [    L  P  ]
               [_...__...*]                   [_...__...*]
                   SSH |                          CSH |
                    |  |                           |  |
 ________           |  |                           |  |
|==|=====|          v  v                           v  v
|  |     |      __________                     __________ 
|  |     |     [_...__...*]                   [_...__...*]
|  |     |        Switch                         Switch
|  |     |          |                              |          _  __ 
|  |====*|          |                              |         |=|[__]
|__|_____|<---------'                              '-------->|_|\::\
  Server                                                     Client

Client:             10.0.1.1        d4:9a:20:c2:52:0e
C-SWI:              10.0.1.8
CSH PRI:            10.0.1.5        00:0e:b6:42:f8:98
CSH 0_0 LAN:        10.0.1.6        00:0e:b6:8c:74:9c
CSH 0_0 WAN:        10.0.1.6        00:0e:b6:8c:74:9b
C-RTR-lan:          10.0.1.9        00:0d:b9:17:28:de
C-RTR-wan           172.16.1.1
                    30 ms
N-RTR-1-wan:        172.16.1.2
N-RTR-1-wan:        172.16.2.1
                    60 ms
N-RTR-2-wan:        172.16.2.2
N-RTR-2-wan:        172.16.3.1
                    40 ms
S-RTR-wan:          172.16.3.2        
S-RTR-lan           192.168.1.9     00:0d:b9:17:28:dd
SSH 0_0 WAN:        192.168.1.6     00:0e:b6:8c:7a:ed
SSH 0_0 LAN:        192.168.1.6     00:0e:b6:8c:7a:ee
SSH PRI:            192.168.1.5     00:0e:b6:31:45:e0
S-SWI:              192.168.1.8
Server:             192.168.1.1     00:21:70:3e:6b:7f