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macOS Monterey's new network quality tool is surprisingly good

danpetrov.xyz

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Re: macOS Monterey's new network quality tool is surprisingly good

#31

Post by zimbatm »

ripperdoc wrote: post #29

Nice! A network tool I've always wanted is one that automates the investigation you have to do manually if you are experienceing "internet issues". I mean, the check list is quite straightforward but still a pretty manual process, stuff like: - Do I have the expected IP? - Is there large packet loss or latency issues hinting at connectivity issues? - Can I ping the local gateway? - Can I ping to outside network? - Is…

Check out https://github.com/ycd/dstp . It's still pretty young but it tries to solve that problem. The author needs more feedback.

Re: macOS Monterey's new network quality tool is surprisingly good

#32

Post by artificialLimbs »

ripperdoc wrote: post #29

Nice! A network tool I've always wanted is one that automates the investigation you have to do manually if you are experienceing "internet issues". I mean, the check list is quite straightforward but still a pretty manual process, stuff like: - Do I have the expected IP? - Is there large packet loss or latency issues hinting at connectivity issues? - Can I ping the local gateway? - Can I ping to outside network? - Is…

    #!/bin/zsh
    ip addr | grep $localNetworkPrefix
    ping $localGateway
    ping 1.1.1.1
    ping $DNS01
    ping $DNS02
    open -a Safari https://downdetector.com/status/%1
Do `chmod +x ./scriptname.sh` to make executable and run with argument (e.g. net.sh facebook) to check a particular service.

Edit: Thanks @Shared404

Re: macOS Monterey's new network quality tool is surprisingly good

#33

Post by wintermutestwin »

ilikepi wrote: post #18
blakesterz wrote: post #2

This is a neat little tool. I had no idea that was hiding in there. Anyone have any other little hidden gems on MacOS?

macOS has had a "hidden" WiFi diagnostic tool for years. It produces real-time-ish graphs of (IIRC) three different signal strength metrics, and it also dumps the data to a file on the desktop as it's doing so. By holding down the "Option" key and clicking the WiFi icon in the menu bar, the dropdown menu will display additional information about the wireless interface, and it will also include an entry that reads "Wi…

Thank you so much for this. I think this is worthy of a separate HN post.

On a related note, these hidden features are really annoying. How hard would it be to have a WiFi diags link in the WiFi dropdown? Why does Apple think that hiding things makes for a better user experience? Is it so that the people in the know get to feel like arcane knowledge masters? As it is, I have started randomly holding down option and command to see if there are hidden options. /rant Does anyone know of a site that catalogs these hidden macos options?

Re: macOS Monterey's new network quality tool is surprisingly good

#34

Post by Shared404 »

artificialLimbs wrote: post #32
ripperdoc wrote: post #29

Nice! A network tool I've always wanted is one that automates the investigation you have to do manually if you are experienceing "internet issues". I mean, the check list is quite straightforward but still a pretty manual process, stuff like: - Do I have the expected IP? - Is there large packet loss or latency issues hinting at connectivity issues? - Can I ping the local gateway? - Can I ping to outside network? - Is…

#!/bin/zsh ip addr | grep $localNetworkPrefix ping $localGateway ping 1.1.1.1 ping $DNS01 ping $DNS02 open -a Safari https://downdetector.com/status/%1 Do `chmod +x ./scriptname.sh` to make executable and run with argument (e.g. net.sh facebook) to check a particular service. Edit: Thanks @Shared404

> Edit: Not sure how to do single spaced newline here.

If you prepend each line with 4 spaces it'll format as code.

Re: macOS Monterey's new network quality tool is surprisingly good

#35

Post by 2c6Nmft »

e_proxus wrote: post #9
screenshot wrote: post #5

Interestingly it uses their own CDN infrastructure by default by checking https://mensura.cdn-apple.com/api/v1/gm/config for which endpoint to use.

That's also the beauty of Fast.com, that it uses the Netflix content servers as benchmark and not some ISP edge hosted Speedtest server with special priority. That gives a more realistic expectation of how Netflix, and in this case Apple downloads, will actually perform. And it can't be artificially boosted by the ISP. That being said, I assume both Netflix and Apple have very special CDNs with ISP co-located content…

I've always found this site to be useful for speedtesting https://www.dslreports.com/speedtest?nav=2

Re: macOS Monterey's new network quality tool is surprisingly good

#36

Post by danpetrov »

judge2020 wrote: post #17

Just tried running it on my (terribly inconsistent and laggy) directv/att satellite internet, and the process crashed with NSInvalidArgumentException. https://gist.github.com/judge2020/ff0279a51ed59a56aa184867c0... (14" MBP base model)

Huh interesting, works fine on my 2018 Intel MBP. Surprising to see a bug like this on the newest models.

Re: macOS Monterey's new network quality tool is surprisingly good

#37

Post by sbr464 »

Shared404 wrote: post #34
artificialLimbs wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

#!/bin/zsh ip addr | grep $localNetworkPrefix ping $localGateway ping 1.1.1.1 ping $DNS01 ping $DNS02 open -a Safari https://downdetector.com/status/%1 Do `chmod +x ./scriptname.sh` to make executable and run with argument (e.g. net.sh facebook) to check a particular service. Edit: Thanks @Shared404

> Edit: Not sure how to do single spaced newline here. If you prepend each line with 4 spaces it'll format as code.

  I believe only 2 spaces
  are required.

Re: macOS Monterey's new network quality tool is surprisingly good

#38

Post by danpetrov »

e_proxus wrote: post #9
screenshot wrote: post #5

Interestingly it uses their own CDN infrastructure by default by checking https://mensura.cdn-apple.com/api/v1/gm/config for which endpoint to use.

That's also the beauty of Fast.com, that it uses the Netflix content servers as benchmark and not some ISP edge hosted Speedtest server with special priority. That gives a more realistic expectation of how Netflix, and in this case Apple downloads, will actually perform. And it can't be artificially boosted by the ISP. That being said, I assume both Netflix and Apple have very special CDNs with ISP co-located content…

That's the thing, ideally you would perform a test for every single service that you use directly to their network.

In my previous company where we were doing live broadcast, we would have speed testers pre-installed on all the hub and edge servers, so we could get realistic numbers for a specific use case (for example, requesting. a video stream from Germany).

Re: macOS Monterey's new network quality tool is surprisingly good

#39

Post by X-Istence »

danpetrov wrote: post #36
judge2020 wrote: post #17

Just tried running it on my (terribly inconsistent and laggy) directv/att satellite internet, and the process crashed with NSInvalidArgumentException. https://gist.github.com/judge2020/ff0279a51ed59a56aa184867c0... (14" MBP base model)

Huh interesting, works fine on my 2018 Intel MBP. Surprising to see a bug like this on the newest models.

I doubt its a bug in a particular model. I'm on an M1 Max and the tool works without issues.

I am guessing its an bug in the tool itself that the user ran into.

Re: macOS Monterey's new network quality tool is surprisingly good

#40

Post by epistasis »

wintermutestwin wrote: post #33
ilikepi wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

macOS has had a "hidden" WiFi diagnostic tool for years. It produces real-time-ish graphs of (IIRC) three different signal strength metrics, and it also dumps the data to a file on the desktop as it's doing so. By holding down the "Option" key and clicking the WiFi icon in the menu bar, the dropdown menu will display additional information about the wireless interface, and it will also include an entry that reads "Wi…

Thank you so much for this. I think this is worthy of a separate HN post. On a related note, these hidden features are really annoying. How hard would it be to have a WiFi diags link in the WiFi dropdown? Why does Apple think that hiding things makes for a better user experience? Is it so that the people in the know get to feel like arcane knowledge masters? As it is, I have started randomly holding down option and c…

I think this is a great method for reducing user interface complexity, by taking rarely useful things out of the main flow.

Option-click is pretty much the only trick used for menus, and it's fairly universal across the nearly 80 years of Mac. The incidence of people that would be helped by those graphs, and the people that option-click is pretty high, so this seems like a great combination. It's similar to option-letter for inputting characters not on the keyboard (alt-code on Windows).

Exposing my parents to one more menu item that will never help them, and mostly confuse them and reduce their scanning speed, well, that's really not worth it. Every option has a cost, and different people bear the weight of that cost differently. Some people like having 30 different brands of canned tomatoes to choose from at the grocery store. Others would prefer 2 or even 1, that are more carefully curated. My favorite grocer is like this. It's a tiny store, an eighth the size of a super market or less, but has a better butcher, better basic groceries, and a more extensive selection of rarer ingredients than a Safeway. It just doesn't have an entire aisle of pasta brands. That's not for everyone, but it is for me. The Mac also doesn't have to be for everyone, it for the people it fits, it fits really well.

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