3.4.1. Pinging the server

The ping command — available on most systems — is a quick and easy way to see if you can connect to a server machine via the network. For example, if your server’s IP address in the domain that is visible to your client is 192.13.14.1, go to a command shell on the client machine and type the command

  1. ping 192.13.14.1

substituting this example IP address with the IP address that your server is broadcasting. If you are on a managed network and you don’t know the server’s IP address, ask your system administrator. Of course, you can also ping the server by its name, if you know it:

  1. ping vercingetorix

If you are connecting to the server from a local client — that is, a client running on the same machine as the server — you can ping the virtual TCP/IP loopback server:

  1. ping localhost

or

  1. ping 127.0.0.1

If you have a simple network of two machines linked by a crossover cable, you can set up your server with any IP address you like except 127.0.0.1 (which is reserved for a local loopback server) and, of course, the IP address which you are using for your client machine. If you know the “native” IP addresses of your network cards, and they are different, you can simply use those.

Once you have verified that the server machine is reachable from the client, you can go on to the next step.