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Network Working Group Marc Seriff Request for Comments 308 MIT-DMCG NIC 9259 13 MARCH 1972 References: RFC 254

ARPANET HOST AVAILABILITY DATA

Several months ago a SURVEY program was implemented on the MIT-DMCG ITS PDP-10 system to aid in gathering information on the availability of various HOSTS on the ARPANET. The purpose of this Request for Comments is threefold:

1. to inform the Network Working Group of the existence of this information gathering service and about getting access to it,

2. to present the results of SURVEY for its first few months, and

3. to correct errors in our data or collection methods.

Briefly, the SURVEY program works as follows: At 15-minute intervals whenever the MIT-DMCG ITS Time-Sharing system is in normal operation, a SURVEY is started. The SURVEY program attempts to establish a connection to the LOGGER (socket 1) of each HOST listed in its table. The results of each connection attempt are recorded for future reference. The Initial Connection Protocol is aborted prior to reading the transmitted socket number so as to cause the minimum amount of processing at SURVEYed HOSTS. If the LOGGER connection succeeds, the average request-for connection response time (in seconds) for the HOST is updated. This information can later be viewed in several formats using the MIT-DMCG server TELNET "NETWRK" as described below.

Each test results in the assignment of one of the following five statuses:

1. LOGGER available - connection completed.

2. LOGGER not responding - RFC sent (HOST-HOST OK), but no response (20 seconds allowed).

3. LOGGER rejecting - CLOSE returned by NCP.

4. NCP not responding - RESET timed out (15 seconds allowed).

5. HOST dead - host-dead status returned by IMP.

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Below you will find a summary of the information gathered to date. It must be remembered that the SURVEY program can only run when MIT-DMCG ITS Time-Sharing System is in normal operation and the MIT IMP is operational. Thus the current figure of 94% for MIT-DMCG is inaccurate. (It should actually be closer to 66%.)

There are, in addition, two other shortcomings of which we are aware. The first is that SURVEY is on a 24-hour basis and does _not_ consider advertised up time. For example, MIT-DMCG will never be better than 67% on a Tuesday since the machine is always unavailable from 4 p.m. to midnight. The second shortcoming is the fact that the Lincoln Lab's TX-2 shows as "never available". This reflects an as yet undiagnosed problem currently under investigation.

To get availability information from DMCG, you must first follow the scenario in RFC 254. Once in NETWRK, the DMCG user-TELNET, there are seven available commands which pertain to SURVEY data:

SUMMARY.OF.SURVEYS - summarizes most recent information.

HISTORY.OF. <host name> - gives a detailed recent history of the given host. This generates a lot of output, so use it sparingly.

ACTIVE.HOSTS - lists those hosts who accepted a connection at least once during the last 24 hours.

BEST.SURVEY - lists the best of the recent surveys.

LONGTERM SUMMARY.OF.SURVEYS - summarizes all past information. This was used to generate the table on the next page.

LONGTERM HISTORY.OF <host name> - gives a summary of past history of the given host. It does not generate as much output as the HISTORY command.

LONGTERM ACTIVE.HOSTS - lists those hosts who accepted a connection at least once since December 13, 1971.

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For the above seven commands, "recent" is define as "within the last 24 hours or less".

For help in accessing SURVEY data and comments on improving the admittedly limited SURVEY service, please contact:

Marc Seriff M.I.T. - Project MAC 545 Main Street Cambridge, Mass. 02139 (617) 864-6900 ext. 1458

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6528 Surveys from 09:55:18 on 12/13/71 to 08:50:41 on 03/20/72 --HOST-- -#- -%-UP- -RESP- * ucla-nmc 001 064% 00.93 sri-arc 002 064% 02.96 ucsb-75 003 048% 00.53 utah-10 004 057% 03.23 bbn-ncc 005 000% 00.00 multics 006 047% 05.60 rand-rcc 007 000% 00.13 sdcadept 010 000% 02.60 harv-10 011 022% 00.23 ll-67 012 021% 03.70 su-sail 013 000% 00.00 ill-11 014 000% 00.06 case-10 015 000% 00.00 cmu-10 016 034% 00.23 burr 017 000% 00.00 ames-67 020 000% 00.00 radc-645 022 000% 00.00 ** nbs-11 023 000% 00.00 ** tink-418 025 000% 00.00 ** usc-44 027 000% 01.13 ** ncar7600 031 000% 00.00 ** ucla-ccn 101 070% 00.30 sri-ai 102 000% 02.26 tenex 105 060% 02.40 mit-dmcg 106 093% 01.10 *** rand-csg 107 013% 02.96 ** harv-1 111 000% 00.23 ll-tx2 112 000% 01.76 ill-6500 114 000% 00.00 burrtest 117 000% 00.00 ** tenexb 205 018% 02.93 mit-ai 206 000% 00.00 harv-11 211 000% 00.00

* Remember that "UP is defined as "Logger Accepting connections." ** Surveyed only since February 18, 1972. *** MIT-DMCG is actually up about 66% of the time.

[ This RFC was put into machine readable form for entry ] [ into the online RFC archives by BBN Corp. under the ] [ direction of Alex McKenzie. 12/96 ]

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