# How do I ping someone using MS-DOS ?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-ping-someone-using-ms-dos/37014>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [October 15, 2000, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-ping-someone-using-ms-dos/37014 "2000-10-15T17:36:41Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![MadHatter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f6c823/32.png) [@MadHatter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MadHatter)\
**Post date:** [October 15, 2000, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-ping-someone-using-ms-dos/37014/1 "2000-10-15T17:36:41Z")

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What do I type?

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**Author:** ![BoBettie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@BoBettie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BoBettie)\
**Post date:** [October 15, 2000, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-ping-someone-using-ms-dos/37014/2 "2000-10-15T17:43:05Z")

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is it another computer on your LAN? If so, type:  
ping 159.15.4.82  
and put the recipients IP in instead of the one I put in there.

The reply should either be:  
timed out  
or  
reply from (IP address)

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**Author:** ![waterj2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/858c86/32.png) [@waterj2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/waterj2)\
**Post date:** [October 15, 2000, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-ping-someone-using-ms-dos/37014/3 "2000-10-15T18:09:13Z")

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There are also flags that you can use when pinging, to do things such as resolving the IP address into what its name is. Type “ping -?” to see a list of these. There’s also tracert, which is like ping, but shows the whole path that it takes across the internet.