An Internet utility used to check the connection with another site.

It is based on an echo request sent from a server (for example IHMS server) to a specified host (for example Yahoo). The latter sends back an echo reply. From the time taken by these packets to complete the path it is possible to measure the response times of the specified host.

Pings are not only used to measure the response times, but also to check if a server is up and running. However, it should be noted that not all systems allow pings, thus it might be that though the server is running, the ping request will get no reply.