icmplib 2.1.1

Easily forge ICMP packets and make your own ping and traceroute.

icmplib is a brand new and modern implementation of the ICMP protocol in Python.
Use the built-in functions or build your own, you have the choice!

Features

• 🌳 Ready-to-use: icmplib offers ready-to-use functions such as the most popular ones: ping, multiping and traceroute.
• 💎 Modern: This library uses the latest technologies offered by Python 3.6+ and is fully object-oriented.
• 🚀 Fast: Each class and function has been designed and optimized to deliver the best performance. Some functions are also multithreaded like the multiping function. You can ping the world in seconds!
• ⚡️ Powerful: Use the library without root privileges, set the traffic class of ICMP packets, customize their payload and more!
• 🔩 Evolutive: Easily build your own classes and functions with ICMPv4 and ICMPv6 sockets.
• 🔥 Seamless integration of IPv6: Use IPv6 the same way you use IPv4. Automatic detection is done without impacting performance.
• 🌈 Broadcast support (you must use the ICMPv4Socket class to enable it).
• 🍺 Support of all operating systems. Tested on Linux, macOS and Windows.
• 🤘 No dependency: icmplib is a pure Python implementation of the ICMP protocol. It does not use any external dependencies.

Installation

The recommended way to install or upgrade icmplib is to use pip3:

$ pip3 install icmplib
$ pip3 install --upgrade icmplib

icmplib requires Python 3.6 or later.

To import icmplib into your project (only import what you need):

# For simple use
from icmplib import ping, multiping, traceroute, resolve, Host, Hop

# For advanced use (sockets)
from icmplib import ICMPv4Socket, ICMPv6Socket, ICMPRequest, ICMPReply

# Exceptions
from icmplib import ICMPLibError, NameLookupError, ICMPSocketError
from icmplib import SocketAddressError, SocketPermissionError
from icmplib import SocketUnavailableError, SocketBroadcastError, TimeoutExceeded
from icmplib import ICMPError, DestinationUnreachable, TimeExceeded

Built-in functions

Ping

Send ICMP Echo Request packets to a network host.

ping(address, count=4, interval=1, timeout=2, id=PID, source=None, privileged=True, **kwargs)

Parameters

• address

  The IP address, hostname or FQDN of the host to which messages should be sent. For deterministic behavior, prefer to use an IP address.

  • Type: str

• count

  The number of ping to perform.

  • Type: int
  • Default: 4

• interval

  The interval in seconds between sending each packet.

  • Type: int or float
  • Default: 1

• timeout

  The maximum waiting time for receiving a reply in seconds.

  • Type: int or float
  • Default: 2

• id

  The identifier of ICMP requests. Used to match the responses with requests. In practice, a unique identifier should be used for every ping process. On Linux, this identifier is ignored when the privileged parameter is disabled.

  • Type: int
  • Default: PID

• source

  The IP address from which you want to send packets. By default, the interface is automatically chosen according to the specified destination.

  • Type: str
  • Default: None

• privileged

  When this option is enabled, this library fully manages the exchanges and the structure of ICMP packets. Disable this option if you want to use this function without root privileges and let the kernel handle ICMP headers.

  Only available on Unix systems. Ignored on Windows.

  • Type: bool
  • Default: True

• payload

  The payload content in bytes. A random payload is used by default.

  • Type: bytes
  • Default: None

• payload_size

  The payload size. Ignored when the payload parameter is set.

  • Type: int
  • Default: 56

• traffic_class

  The traffic class of ICMP packets. Provides a defined level of service to packets by setting the DS Field (formerly TOS) or the Traffic Class field of IP headers. Packets are delivered with the minimum priority by default (Best-effort delivery). Intermediate routers must be able to support this feature.

  Only available on Unix systems. Ignored on Windows.

  • Type: int
  • Default: 0

Return value

• A Host object containing statistics about the desired destination:
  address, min_rtt, avg_rtt, max_rtt, packets_sent, packets_received, packet_loss, is_alive

Exceptions

• NameLookupError

  If you pass a hostname or FQDN in parameters and it does not exist or cannot be resolved.

• SocketPermissionError

  If the privileges are insufficient to create the socket.

• SocketAddressError

  If the source address cannot be assigned to the socket.

• ICMPSocketError

  If another error occurs. See the ICMPv4Socket or ICMPv6Socket class for details.

Example

>>> host = ping('1.1.1.1', count=10, interval=0.2)

>>> host.address            # The IP address of the host that responded
'1.1.1.1'                   # to the request

>>> host.min_rtt            # The minimum round-trip time
12.2

>>> host.avg_rtt            # The average round-trip time
13.2

>>> host.max_rtt            # The maximum round-trip time
17.6

>>> host.packets_sent       # The number of packets transmitted to the
10                          # destination host

>>> host.packets_received   # The number of packets sent by the remote
9                           # host and received by the current host

>>> host.packet_loss        # Packet loss occurs when packets fail to
0.1                         # reach their destination. Returns a float
                            # between 0 and 1 (all packets are lost)
>>> host.is_alive           # Indicates whether the host is reachable
True

Multiping

Send ICMP Echo Request packets to several network hosts.

This function relies on a single thread to send multiple packets simultaneously. If you mix IPv4 and IPv6 addresses, up to two threads are used.

multiping(addresses, count=2, interval=0.01, timeout=2, id=PID, source=None, privileged=True, **kwargs)

Parameters

• addresses

  The IP addresses of the hosts to which messages should be sent. Hostnames and FQDNs are not allowed. You can easily retrieve their IP address by calling the built-in resolve function.

  • Type: list of str

• count

  The number of ping to perform per address.

  • Type: int
  • Default: 2

• interval

  The interval in seconds between sending each packet.

  • Type: int or float
  • Default: 0.01

• timeout

  The maximum waiting time for receiving all responses in seconds.

  • Type: int or float
  • Default: 2

• id

  The identifier of ICMP requests. Used to match the responses with requests. This identifier will be incremented by one for each destination. On Linux, this identifier is ignored when the privileged parameter is disabled.

  • Type: int
  • Default: PID

• source

  The IP address from which you want to send packets. By default, the interface is automatically chosen according to the specified destination. This parameter should not be used if you are passing both IPv4 and IPv6 addresses to this function.

  • Type: str
  • Default: None

• privileged

  When this option is enabled, this library fully manages the exchanges and the structure of ICMP packets. Disable this option if you want to use this function without root privileges and let the kernel handle ICMP headers.

  Only available on Unix systems. Ignored on Windows.

  • Type: bool
  • Default: True

• payload

  The payload content in bytes. A random payload is used by default.

  • Type: bytes
  • Default: None

• payload_size

  The payload size. Ignored when the payload parameter is set.

  • Type: int
  • Default: 56

• traffic_class

  The traffic class of ICMP packets. Provides a defined level of service to packets by setting the DS Field (formerly TOS) or the Traffic Class field of IP headers. Packets are delivered with the minimum priority by default (Best-effort delivery). Intermediate routers must be able to support this feature.

  Only available on Unix systems. Ignored on Windows.

  • Type: int
  • Default: 0

Return value

• A list of Host objects containing statistics about the desired destinations:
  address, min_rtt, avg_rtt, max_rtt, packets_sent, packets_received, packet_loss, is_alive

  The list is sorted in the same order as the addresses passed in parameters.

Exceptions

• SocketPermissionError

  If the privileges are insufficient to create the socket.

• SocketAddressError

  If the source address cannot be assigned to the socket.

• ICMPSocketError

  If another error occurs. See the ICMPv4Socket or ICMPv6Socket class for details.

Example

>>> hosts = multiping(['10.0.0.5', '127.0.0.1', '::1'])

>>> for host in hosts:
...     if host.is_alive:
...         # See the Host class for details
...         print(f'{host.address} is alive!')
...
...     else:
...         print(f'{host.address} is dead!')
...

# 10.0.0.5 is dead!
# 127.0.0.1 is alive!
# ::1 is alive!

Traceroute

Determine the route to a destination host.

The Internet is a large and complex aggregation of network hardware, connected together by gateways. Tracking the route one's packets follow can be difficult. This function uses the IP protocol time to live field and attempts to elicit an ICMP Time Exceeded response from each gateway along the path to some host.

This function requires root privileges to run.

traceroute(address, count=2, interval=0.05, timeout=2, id=PID, first_hop=1, max_hops=30, source=None, fast=False, **kwargs)

Parameters

• address

  The IP address, hostname or FQDN of the host to reach. For deterministic behavior, prefer to use an IP address.

  • Type: str

• count

  The number of ping to perform per hop.

  • Type: int
  • Default: 2

• interval

  The interval in seconds between sending each packet.

  • Type: int or float
  • Default: 0.05

• timeout

  The maximum waiting time for receiving a reply in seconds.

  • Type: int or float
  • Default: 2

• id

  The identifier of ICMP requests. Used to match the responses with requests. In practice, a unique identifier should be used for every traceroute process.

  • Type: int
  • Default: PID

• first_hop

  The initial time to live value used in outgoing probe packets.

  • Type: int
  • Default: 1

• max_hops

  The maximum time to live (max number of hops) used in outgoing probe packets.

  • Type: int
  • Default: 30

• source

  The IP address from which you want to send packets. By default, the interface is automatically chosen according to the specified destination.

  • Type: str
  • Default: None

• fast

  When this option is enabled and an intermediate router has been reached, skip to the next hop rather than perform additional requests. The count parameter then becomes the maximum number of requests in the event of no response.

  • Type: bool
  • Default: False

• payload

  The payload content in bytes. A random payload is used by default.

  • Type: bytes
  • Default: None

• payload_size

  The payload size. Ignored when the payload parameter is set.

  • Type: int
  • Default: 56

• traffic_class

  The traffic class of ICMP packets. Provides a defined level of service to packets by setting the DS Field (formerly TOS) or the Traffic Class field of IP headers. Packets are delivered with the minimum priority by default (Best-effort delivery). Intermediate routers must be able to support this feature.

  Only available on Unix systems. Ignored on Windows.

  • Type: int
  • Default: 0

Return value

• A list of Hop objects representing the route to the desired destination. A Hop has the same properties as a Host object but it also has a distance.

  The list is sorted in ascending order according to the distance, in terms of hops, that separates the remote host from the current machine. Gateways that do not respond to requests are not added to this list.

Exceptions

• NameLookupError

  If you pass a hostname or FQDN in parameters and it does not exist or cannot be resolved.

• SocketPermissionError

  If the privileges are insufficient to create the socket.

• SocketAddressError

  If the source address cannot be assigned to the socket.

• ICMPSocketError

  If another error occurs. See the ICMPv4Socket or ICMPv6Socket class for details.

Example

>>> hops = traceroute('1.1.1.1')

>>> print('Distance/TTL    Address    Average round-trip time')
>>> last_distance = 0

>>> for hop in hops:
...     if last_distance + 1 != hop.distance:
...         print('Some gateways are not responding')
...
...     # See the Hop class for details
...     print(f'{hop.distance}    {hop.address}    {hop.avg_rtt} ms')
...
...     last_distance = hop.distance
...

# Distance/TTL    Address                 Average round-trip time
# 1               10.0.0.1                5.196 ms
# 2               194.149.169.49          7.552 ms
# 3               194.149.166.54          12.21 ms
# *               Some gateways are not responding
# 5               212.73.205.22           22.15 ms
# 6               1.1.1.1                 13.59 ms

ICMP sockets

If you want to create your own functions and classes using the ICMP protocol, you can use the ICMPv4Socket (for IPv4 only) and the ICMPv6Socket (for IPv6 only). These classes have many methods and properties in common. They manipulate ICMPRequest and ICMPReply objects.

                                    ┌──────────────────┐
  ┌─────────────────┐   send(...)   │   ICMPv4Socket   │   receive()   ┌─────────────────┐
  │   ICMPRequest   │ ────────────> │        or        │ ────────────> │    ICMPReply    │
  └─────────────────┘               │   ICMPv6Socket   │               └─────────────────┘
                                    └──────────────────┘

ICMPRequest

A user-created object that represents an ICMP Echo Request.

ICMPRequest(destination, id, sequence, payload=None, payload_size=56, ttl=64, traffic_class=0)

Parameters and properties

• destination

  The IP address of the host to which the message should be sent.

  • Type: str

• id

  The identifier of the request. Used to match the reply with the request. In practice, a unique identifier is used for every ping process. On Linux, this identifier is automatically replaced if the request is sent from an unprivileged socket.

  • Type: int

• sequence

  The sequence number. Used to match the reply with the request. Typically, the sequence number is incremented for each packet sent during the process.

  • Type: int

• payload

  The payload content in bytes. A random payload is used by default.

  • Type: bytes
  • Default: None

• payload_size

  The payload size. Ignored when the payload parameter is set.

  • Type: int
  • Default: 56

• ttl

  The time to live of the packet in terms of hops.

  • Type: int
  • Default: 64

• traffic_class

  The traffic class of the packet. Provides a defined level of service to the packet by setting the DS Field (formerly TOS) or the Traffic Class field of the IP header. Packets are delivered with the minimum priority by default (Best-effort delivery). Intermediate routers must be able to support this feature.

  Only available on Unix systems. Ignored on Windows.

  • Type: int
  • Default: 0

Properties only

• time

  The timestamp of the ICMP request. Initialized to zero when creating the request and replaced by the send method of ICMPv4Socket or ICMPv6Socket with the time of sending.

  • Type: float

ICMPReply

A class that represents an ICMP reply. Generated from an ICMP socket (ICMPv4Socket or ICMPv6Socket).

ICMPReply(source, id, sequence, type, code, bytes_received, time)

Parameters and properties

• source

  The IP address of the gateway or host that composes the ICMP message.

  • Type: str

• id

  The identifier of the reply. Used to match the reply with the request.

  • Type: int

• sequence

  The sequence number. Used to match the reply with the request.

  • Type: int

• type

  The type of ICMP message.

  • Type: int

• code

  The ICMP error code.

  • Type: int

• bytes_received

  The number of bytes received.

  • Type: int

• time

  The timestamp of the ICMP reply.

  • Type: float

Methods

• raise_for_status()

  Throw an exception if the reply is not an ICMP Echo Reply. Otherwise, do nothing.

  • Raises DestinationUnreachable: If the destination is unreachable for some reason.
  • Raises TimeExceeded: If the time to live field of the ICMP request has reached zero.
  • Raises ICMPError: Raised for any other type and ICMP error code, except ICMP Echo Reply messages.

ICMPv4Socket

Class for sending and receiving ICMPv4 packets.

ICMPv4Socket(address=None, privileged=True)

Parameters

• source

  The IP address from which you want to listen and send packets. By default, the socket listens on all interfaces.

  • Type: str
  • Default: None

• privileged

  When this option is enabled, the socket fully manages the exchanges and the structure of the ICMP packets. Disable this option if you want to instantiate and use the socket without root privileges and let the kernel handle ICMP headers.

  Only available on Unix systems. Ignored on Windows.

  • Type: bool
  • Default: True

Methods

• __init__(address=None, privileged=True)

  Constructor. Automatically called: do not call it directly.

  • Raises SocketPermissionError: If the privileges are insufficient to create the socket.
  • Raises SocketAddressError: If the requested address cannot be assigned to the socket.
  • Raises ICMPSocketError: If another error occurs while creating the socket.

• __del__()

  Destructor. Automatically called: do not call it directly.

  Call the close method.

• send(request)

  Send an ICMP request message over the network to a remote host.
  This operation is non-blocking. Use the receive method to get the reply.

  • Parameter request (ICMPRequest): The ICMP request you have created. If the socket is used in non-privileged mode on a Linux system, the identifier defined in the request will be replaced by the kernel.
  • Raises SocketBroadcastError: If a broadcast address is used and the corresponding option is not enabled on the socket (ICMPv4 only).
  • Raises SocketUnavailableError: If the socket is closed.
  • Raises ICMPSocketError: If another error occurs while sending.

• receive(request=None, timeout=2)

  Receive an ICMP reply message from the socket.
  This method can be called multiple times if you expect several responses as with a broadcast address.

  • Parameter request (ICMPRequest): The ICMP request to use to match the response. By default, all ICMP packets arriving on the socket are returned.
  • Parameter timeout (int or float): The maximum waiting time for receiving the response in seconds. Default to 2.
  • Raises TimeoutExceeded: If no response is received before the timeout specified in parameters.
  • Raises SocketUnavailableError: If the socket is closed.
  • Raises ICMPSocketError: If another error occurs while receiving.

  Returns an ICMPReply object representing the response of the desired destination or an upstream gateway.

• close()

  Close the socket. It cannot be used after this call.

Properties

• address

  The IP address from which the socket listens and sends packets. Return None if the socket listens on all interfaces.

  • Type: str

• is_privileged

  Indicate whether the socket is running in privileged mode.

  • Type: bool

• is_closed

  Indicate whether the socket is closed.

  • Type: bool

Properties and setters

• broadcast

  Enable or disable the broadcast support on the socket.

  • Type: bool
  • Default: False

ICMPv6Socket

Class for sending and receiving ICMPv6 packets.

ICMPv6Socket(address=None, privileged=True)

Methods and properties

The same methods and properties as for the ICMPv4Socket class, except the broadcast property.

Exceptions

The library contains many exceptions to adapt to your needs:

ICMPLibError
 ├─ NameLookupError
 ├─ ICMPSocketError
 │  ├─ SocketAddressError
 │  ├─ SocketPermissionError
 │  ├─ SocketUnavailableError
 │  ├─ SocketBroadcastError
 │  └─ TimeoutExceeded
 │
 └─ ICMPError
    ├─ DestinationUnreachable
    │  ├─ ICMPv4DestinationUnreachable
    │  └─ ICMPv6DestinationUnreachable
    │
    └─ TimeExceeded
       ├─ ICMPv4TimeExceeded
       └─ ICMPv6TimeExceeded

• ICMPLibError: Exception class for the icmplib package.
• NameLookupError: Raised when the requested name does not exist or cannot be resolved. This concerns both Fully Qualified Domain Names and hostnames.
• ICMPSocketError: Base class for ICMP sockets exceptions.
• SocketAddressError: Raised when the requested address cannot be assigned to the socket.
• SocketPermissionError: Raised when the privileges are insufficient to create the socket.
• SocketUnavailableError: Raised when an action is performed while the socket is closed.
• SocketBroadcastError: Raised when a broadcast address is used and the corresponding option is not enabled on the socket.
• TimeoutExceeded: Raised when a timeout occurs on a socket.
• ICMPError: Base class for ICMP error messages.
• DestinationUnreachable: Destination Unreachable message is generated by the host or its inbound gateway to inform the client that the destination is unreachable for some reason.
• TimeExceeded: Time Exceeded message is generated by a gateway to inform the source of a discarded datagram due to the time to live field reaching zero. A Time Exceeded message may also be sent by a host if it fails to reassemble a fragmented datagram within its time limit.

Use the message property to get the error message. ICMPError subclasses have a reply property to retrieve the response.

Examples

Sockets in action

def single_ping(address, timeout=2, id=PID):
    # Create an ICMP socket
    sock = ICMPv4Socket()

    # Create an ICMP request
    # See the 'ICMPRequest' class for details
    request = ICMPRequest(
        destination=address,
        id=id,
        sequence=1)

    try:
        sock.send(request)

        # If the program arrives in this section, it means that the
        # packet has been transmitted.

        reply = sock.receive(request, timeout)

        # If the program arrives in this section, it means that a
        # packet has been received. The reply has the same identifier
        # and sequence number that the request but it can come from
        # an intermediate gateway.

        reply.raise_for_status()

        # If the program arrives in this section, it means that the
        # destination host has responded to the request.

    except TimeoutExceeded as err:
        # The timeout has been reached
        print(err)

    except DestinationUnreachable as err:
        # The reply indicates that the destination host is unreachable
        print(err)

        # Retrieve the response
        reply = err.reply

    except TimeExceeded as err:
        # The reply indicates that the time to live exceeded in transit
        print(err)

        # Retrieve the response
        reply = err.reply

    except ICMPLibError as err:
        # All other errors
        print(err)

    # Automatic socket closure (garbage collector)

Verbose ping

def verbose_ping(address, count=4, interval=1, timeout=2, id=PID):
    # A payload of 56 bytes is used by default. You can modify it using
    # the 'payload_size' parameter of your ICMP request.
    print(f'PING {address}: 56 data bytes\n')

    # We detect the socket to use from the specified IP address
    if is_ipv6_address(address):
        sock = ICMPv6Socket()

    else:
        sock = ICMPv4Socket()

    for sequence in range(count):
        # We create an ICMP request
        request = ICMPRequest(
            destination=address,
            id=id,
            sequence=sequence)

        try:
            # We send the request
            sock.send(request)

            # We are awaiting receipt of an ICMP reply
            reply = sock.receive(request, timeout)

            # We received a reply
            # We display some information
            print(f'{reply.bytes_received} bytes from '
                  f'{reply.source}: ', end='')

            # We throw an exception if it is an ICMP error message
            reply.raise_for_status()

            # We calculate the round-trip time and we display it
            round_trip_time = (reply.time - request.time) * 1000

            print(f'icmp_seq={sequence} '
                  f'time={round(round_trip_time, 3)} ms')

            # We pause before continuing
            if sequence < count - 1:
                sleep(interval)

        except TimeoutExceeded:
            # The timeout has been reached
            print(f'Request timeout for icmp_seq {sequence}')

        except ICMPError as err:
            # An ICMP error message has been received
            print(err)

        except ICMPLibError:
            # All other errors
            print('An error has occurred.')


verbose_ping('1.1.1.1')

# PING 1.1.1.1: 56 data bytes
# 64 bytes from 1.1.1.1: icmp_seq=0 time=12.061 ms
# 64 bytes from 1.1.1.1: icmp_seq=1 time=12.597 ms
# 64 bytes from 1.1.1.1: icmp_seq=2 time=12.475 ms
# 64 bytes from 1.1.1.1: icmp_seq=3 time=10.822 ms

FAQ

How to resolve a FQDN/domain name or a hostname?

The use of the built-in resolve function is recommended:

>>> resolve('github.com')
'140.82.118.4'

• If several IP addresses are available, only the first one is returned. This function searches for IPv4 addresses first before searching for IPv6 addresses.
• If you pass an IP address, no lookup is done. The same address is returned.
• Raises a NameLookupError exception if the requested name does not exist or cannot be resolved.

How to use the library without root privileges?

Since its version 2.0, icmplib can be used without root privileges.

For this, you can set the privileged parameter to False on the ping and multiping functions, as well as the low level classes. By disabling this parameter, the kernel handles some parts of the ICMP headers.

On some Linux systems, you must allow this feature:

$ echo 'net.ipv4.ping_group_range = 0 2147483647' | sudo tee -a /etc/sysctl.conf
$ sudo sysctl -p

You can check the current value with the following command:

$ sysctl net.ipv4.ping_group_range
net.ipv4.ping_group_range = 0 2147483647

Since Ubuntu 20.04 LTS, this manipulation is no longer necessary.

Read more on www.kernel.org

Why I have no response from a remote host?

In the event of no response from a remote host, several causes are possible:

• Your computer's firewall may not be properly configured. This impacts in particular the traceroute function which can no longer receive ICMP Time Exceeded messages.
• The remote host or an upstream gateway is down.
• The remote host or an upstream gateway drops ICMP messages for security reasons.
• In the case of the traceroute function, if the last host in the list is not the one expected, more than 30 hops (default) may be needed to reach it. You can try increasing the value of the max_hops parameter.

Contributing

Comments and enhancements are welcome.

All development is done on GitHub. Use Issues to report problems and submit feature requests. Please include a minimal example that reproduces the bug.

Donate

icmplib is completely free and open source. It has been fully developed on my free time. If you enjoy it, please consider donating to support the development.

• 🎉 Donate via PayPal

License

Copyright 2017-2021 Valentin BELYN.

Code released under the GNU LGPLv3 license. See the LICENSE for details.