[comp.protocols.tcp-ip] A new record?

chris@MIMSY.UMD.EDU (Chris Torek) (05/07/88)

PING okeeffe.berkeley.edu (128.32.130.3): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 128.32.130.3: icmp_seq=11. time=253239. ms
64 bytes from 128.32.130.3: icmp_seq=294. time=1070. ms

So where *was* that packet for four minutes and 13 seconds?
(Maybe it was routed via the University of Mars :-) )

Chris

swb@DEVVAX.TN.CORNELL.EDU (Scott Brim) (05/07/88)

Chris: not a record, unfortunately.  Dave Mills, at least, has one
that returned after 16 minutes and something -- I'll bet there are
even better ones.
						Scott

milazzo@RICE.EDU (Paul Milazzo) (05/07/88)

Chris:

I once ran ping for hours on a newly-installed proNet-10, with
similarly frightening results.  My host, a lightly-loaded VAX-11/750,
was pinging itself because it was the only host on the ring.  Amidst
thousands of 20 msec round-trip times, one ping returned---out of
sequence---after 11.5 seconds!

Where could it have hidden for that long?  I assume it was parked in an
mbuf somewhere; a three-million kilometer detour seems unlikely...

				Paul G. Milazzo <milazzo@rice.EDU>
				Dept. of Computer Science
				Rice University, Houston, TX

ruffwork@orstcs.CS.ORST.EDU (Ritchey Ruff) (05/09/88)

In article <8805062353.AA23117@mimsy.umd.edu> chris@MIMSY.UMD.EDU (Chris Torek) writes:
>PING okeeffe.berkeley.edu (128.32.130.3): 56 data bytes
>64 bytes from 128.32.130.3: icmp_seq=11. time=253239. ms
>64 bytes from 128.32.130.3: icmp_seq=294. time=1070. ms
>
>So where *was* that packet for four minutes and 13 seconds?
>(Maybe it was routed via the University of Mars :-) )
>
>Chris

Well, in 253.239 seconds light can travel 75,971,700 klicks.
Mars is (ruff-ly) around 120,000,000 klicks away right now, so it didn't
get routed through the Protion gateway at U of Mars.  My guess
is that some VAX at a circular partical accellerator is going
flakey and routed this ICMP into the partical beam path...round and
round your data goes...

--ritchey ruff	ruffwork@cs.orst.edu -or- ...!hp-pcd!orstcs!ruffwork

hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu (Charles Hedrick) (05/11/88)

In article <8805062353.AA23117@mimsy.umd.edu> chris@MIMSY.UMD.EDU (Chris Torek) writes:
>PING okeeffe.berkeley.edu (128.32.130.3): 56 data bytes
>64 bytes from 128.32.130.3: icmp_seq=11. time=253239. ms
>64 bytes from 128.32.130.3: icmp_seq=294. time=1070. ms
>
>So where *was* that packet for four minutes and 13 seconds?

Presumably in various gateway queues.  However you might also check
your ping to make sure it handles timing correctly when lots of
packets are being dropped.  One could imagine a bug that would
cause it to report a time for the wrong one.  This has happened
to TCP implementations, as I'm sure you know.