CHAPTER 23

Network Hardware Test (nettest)

nettest checks all the networking hardware on the system CPU board and separate networking controllers (for example, a second SBus Ethernet controller). For this test to be meaningful, the machine under test must be attached to a network with at least one other system on the network.

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Note - This version of nettest is used for all networking devices, including Ethernet (ie and le), token ring (tr, trp), quad Ethernet (QED), fiber optic (fddi, nf, bf, pf), SPARCcluster^(TM) 1 System (em), ATM (sa, ba), and 100-Mbits per second Ethernet (be,hme) devices.

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The nettest mainly uses the Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP), and requires at least two machines on a network--the machine under test and another machine reliable enough to be a test target. Both machines must support the transport control protocol/interface program (TCP/IP) (ICMP is part of TCP/IP). The target machine must either be configured to respond to ICMP broadcast or to RPC broadcast.

First nettest determines the target machine(s) to test against. If no targets are specified, it sends an ICMP broadcast to find them. If it fails to find all necessary targets, it tries RPC broadcast to the RPC port mapper daemon. If you specify the targets, nettest uses the specified target(s) instead.

After finding the necessary targets, nettest performs the following tests:

• Random test sends out 256 packets with random data length and random data.
• Incremental test sends out packets with length from minimum to maximum packet size using incremental data. (Minimum and maximum values differ for each device.)
• Pattern test sends 256 packets of maximum length, where each packet contains one test pattern, and all byte patterns (0 to 0xFF hex) are used. That is, the first packet contains pattern 0, the second packet contains pattern 1, and so on, until the last packet pattern of 0xFF.

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Note - nettest is a scalable test. However, the maximum number of networked devices allowed on a system is 255, and the number of instances for each device is limited to 200. So, if you start the SunVTS exerciser using the -i option to specify a default number of instances for all tests, nettest cannot assign more than 200 instances per each networked device.

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nettest Options

FIGURE 23-1 nettest

The Configuration section specifies the host name, host ID, host address, and domain name of the system being tested.

TABLE 23-1 nettest

nettest Options	Description
Target Host	Specifies one or more targets to be tested against. Target host entries can be either a host name or an Internet address. When no target host is specified, the test finds necessary targets through broadcasting. The default setting leaves this field empty.
Receive Timeout field	The default is 120 seconds, but can be changed. Use a range between 0 - 600 seconds.
Number of Retries field	The default number of retries before flagging an error is three, but can be changed. Use a range between 0 to 128 retries.
Print Warning	Disabled by default. Click Enable to see warning errors, such as retry on timeout.

nettest Test Modes

All three modes are supported by nettest. Different test schemes are performed on the network device based on the mode selected.

TABLE 23-2 nettest

Test Mode	Description
Connection Test	Checks whether the device is connected. It searches through all the network interfaces fora specified device name. If nettest does not find the device connected the test fails, otherwise it returns: device is connected.
Functional Test	Performs all three tests (Random test, Incremental test, and Pattern test) sequentially. It allows you to specify options that will perform heavy stress testing. If you invoke SunVTS through SyMON, the following Functional Test description applies: Online mode, nettest is aware that the user's application may be running, it tries to minimize the influence on the application while it is testing. So the nettest uses only random test in online mode. Since the network device can be shared and the system resource is available, applications shall be affected fairly small
Online Mode	Provides a means to run nettest through SyMON. The following Online Functional Test description applies: nettest is aware that the user's application may be running, it tries to minimize the influence on the application while it is testing. So nettest uses only random test in Online mode. Since the network device is shared and system resources are available, applications are minimally affected.

nettest Command Line Syntax

/opt/SUNWvts/bin/nettest standard_arguments -o target=h1+h2+...,
dev=interface,test=type,packets=n,pattern=hex,delay=seconds,
timeout=seconds,retry=n,warn

TABLE 23-3 nettest

Argument	Explanation
target=h1+h2+...	A list of test targets by host name or Internet address.
dev=interface	Network interface name. The default value is le0 for Ethernet networks.
test=type	The test type. Type Random, Increment, or Pattern for the desired test. The default value is Random+Increment+Pattern where all tests run.
packets=n	Number of random/pattern packets. The default is 256.
pattern=hexn	Specifies a data pattern, in hexadecimal form. The default is all patterns from 0 to 0xff.
delay=seconds	Indicates the time between subtests in seconds; the default is 30 seconds.
timeout=seconds	Indicates the number of seconds to wait before a timeout; the default is 20 seconds.
retry=n	Indicates the number of test timeout retries; the default is three retries.
warn	When enabled, prints warning messages.

nettest Error Messages

TABLE 23-4 nettest

	Error Message	Probable Cause(s)	Recommended Action
6000	RPC broadcast failure error_message
6001	Unable to resolve host_name Ethernet address
6002	No ICMP echo reply from host_name	System load too heavy.	Reduce system load or increase timeout time.
		No cable connection.	Check cable connection!
		Target machine too busy.	Reduce target machine load.
6003	ICMP echo reply incorrect length from host_name, exp data obs data
6004	ICMP echo reply length number from host_name, data mismatch at byte number, exp value obs value
6005	Unable to find any test target
6006	Unable to find necessary test targets for the ethernet switch
8000	Unable to open device_name error_message
8001	Bad ioctl name error_message
8002	Unable to allocate number bytes of memory error_message
8003	System call name returned value error_message
8004	Unable to map network entry for host_name
8005	ATM device device_name requires target specification

TABLE 23-4 nettest(Continued)

	Error Message	Probable Cause(s)	Recommended Action
8006	Failed to allocate number bytes of swap space for configuration
8007	dl_primitive response = value
8008	dl_ok_ack: short response
8009	dl_phys_addr_ack: short response
8010	Invalid Argument string
8011	Interface device_name not configured in system