Using Ping Feature More Effectively!

Ping is one of the features of Pinkie that I use extensively as a network admin.  In this blog, I’ll show you how to take advantage of all the extra enhancements that come with Pinkie which you don’t have in the Command Window.

  • Ping Multiple Hosts: Press F1 to bring up the Add Host Address dialog. Enter hosts/IP addresses which can be separated by space, comma, semi-colon, tab or a line feed.
  • Reduce/Increase # of Rows Displayed For Ping Results: By default, Pinkie will show you 4 lines of ping results. This can fill up the window pretty quick if you ping multiple hosts at the same time. To reduce the # of rows, press F3 or increase it by F4.
  • Check Ping Statistics For a Host: Select a host by clicking on it, the status bar at the bottom will change to show the ping statistics for the selected host which includes packets sent/received, lost count & percentage, last ping RTT along with Min, Max & Avg RTTs.
  • Start/Stop a Ping: Right click on the host you want to start/stop pinging, select Ping first menu item in the context menu will change to Start/Stop as appropriate. Clicking on it will stop a ping in progress or start it if it’s not started yet.
  • Reset Ping Statistics: Right click on a host you want to reset statistics, select Ping then click on Reset Statistics.
  • Copy Ping Results: When troubleshooting network or server issues, you might have the need to send the ping result to someone. This can be done by simply right click on the host and select Copy Result to Clipboard. then paste it to an email or wherever you wish.
  • Logging Ping Results to Disk: If you wish to log ping results to a file to analyze later or send it to someone else, right click on the host, select Ping then in the context menu, click on Start Logging or Stop Logging as appropriate. By default, the ping results will be saved in C:\Users\[username]\Documents\ipUptime.net\Pinkie_Logs\. You can change this path in the Settings menu.

That’s not all of the enhancements that come with the Ping feature in Pinkie but it will definitely make you like and use Pinkie more.

If you can come up with a better way to use Ping or wish to have enhancements added to it, please let me know.

A Fresh New Look

I’ve decided to switch to WordPress and use it as the CMS platform to manage the website. By doing this, I can leverage the CMS to maintain and update the website, giving me more time to focus on the development of Pinkie itself.

The primary reason for this decision basically boils down to time & resource management. For the last six months or so, I’ve been pretty busy and haven’t been able to keep up with all the work that I have in the pipeline for Pinkie. As the result of that, Pinkie’s v2.15 was delayed about 4-5 months.

Hopefully, going forward I can devote more time to develop Pinkie and add more functionality to it.

What do you think of the new website?

Best Regards,
Brian Dao

Download Pinkie v2.15

Pinkie v2.15 is the current release as of May 2012. The older versions are no longer supported and have been removed.

v2.15 is available in both 32 and 64 bit. Please select the appropriate version for your operating system.

Pinkie v2.15

Pinkie has been through over three years of continuous development and improvements. The current version is v2.15. This is the latest and greatest as of May 2012. Below are the changes/bug fixes that have been implemented in this version.

  • Added IPv6 support for Ping, DNS, Traceroute, Subnet Calculator & PortScanner
  • Added Bulk DNS lookup
  • Added input validation for IPv4 & IPv6
  • Added option to use Enter key as new line
  • Added option to edit host list
  • Added option to exclude primary hosts
  • Added option to keep main window on top of other screens
  • Added feedback option
  • Added View menu
  • Added delimiters (comma, semi-colon, space, pipe) for new hosts
  • Added input validation for various input controls
  • Added option to show last notification
  • Added keyboard shortcuts
  • Added Tell a Friend feature
  • Added Comment feature
  • Added link to report bug
  • Added link to request feature
  • Added application icons
  • Fixed keyboard bugs for input fields (up, down, left, right, backspace, delete….)
  • Fixed screen flickering on Ping tab
  • Fixed bug in portscanner when using range of ports
  • Fixed bug in pingsweep where resolving/responding host count doesn’t reset
  • Fixed column formatting when export for pingsweep
  • Fixed split distance when restore to default size (F12)
  • Fixed program still runs in the background if it is closed by user X it out
  • Fixed IPv6 logging issues
  • Fixed dropdown boxes
  • Updated software registration/action process
  • Updated system notification protocol & UI
  • Updated application logo