Running each of the following tests from a computer that is actively experiencing slow system response from IM Practice Manager and sending the results to IM Technical Support
will be of tremendous help in determining the cause (or at least ruling out several possible causes) of the slow
response.
Ping
is a tool that sends internet traffic to a selected location on the
Internet and reports how long that traffic takes to reach the
destination and return to the originating machine (sort of like
measuring the length of time between your saying "Hello!" from the top
of a mountain and your hearing the echo of your "Hello!" from the
adjacent peak). It gives a quick overall assessment of how
quickly information is traveling between your computer and the internet
resource you're accessing, and indicates if there is any information
being lost along the way as well. The ping command is executed
from a DOS or command prompt. An internet connection must be
present.
- Click
on Start / Run. Type "command" into the dialog box (do not include the quotes), then
click OK.
- In the resulting command line window, type "ping secure.imbills.com -n 100 > imping.txt" (do
not include the quotes, and note there is a single space between "ping"
and "secure.imbills.com" as well as before and after both the "-n" and the ">").
- Note the file path indicated at the command prompt (this information will be needed later).
- Press Enter.
This
test may take several seconds to complete (even as long as 2-3
minutes), during which time the cursor in the command prompt window
will remain unresponsive to keystrokes. At the conclusion of the
test, a new command prompt will appear in the window and the cursor
will respond to keystrokes once again. You may continue to use
applications in other windows while waiting for this test to complete.
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Traceroute
is a tool that follows the route Internet traffic uses when traveling
from one location to another, then reports the time that traffic takes
to complete each leg of the route. It is helpful in identifying
points along that route that traffic may be encountering problems and
travelling more slowly than it should. The traceroute command is executed from a DOS or command prompt. An internet connection must be present.
- Click
on Start / Run. Type "command" into the dialog box (do not include the quotes), then
click OK.
- In the resulting command line window, type "tracert secure.imbills.com > imtracert.txt" (do
not include the quotes, and note there is a single space between "tracert"
and "secure.imbills.com" as well as before and after the ">").
- Note the file path indicated at the command prompt (this information will be needed later).
- Press Enter.
This test may take several
seconds to complete (even as long as 2-3 minutes), during which time
the cursor in the command prompt window will remain unresponsive to keystrokes.
At the conclusion of the test, a new command prompt will appear in the window and
the cursor will respond to keystrokes once again. You may continue to
use applications in other windows while waiting for this test to
complete.
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Pathping
is a tool that combines certain elements of both the ping and the
traceroute, and includes some additional info as well. It will
show the route taken by traffic, and show the amount of information
that is lost as it traverses each leg of the route. The pathping command is executed from a DOS or command prompt. An internet connection must be present.
- Click
on Start / Run. Type "command" into the dialog box (do not include the quotes), then
click OK.
- In the resulting command line window, type "pathping secure.imbills.com > impathping.txt" (do
not include the quotes, and note there is a single space between "pathping"
and "secure.imbills.com" as well as before and after the ">").
- Note the file path indicated at the command prompt (this information will be needed later).
- Press Enter.
This test may take several
seconds to complete (even as long as 3-4 minutes), during which time
the cursor in the command prompt window will remain unresponsive to keystrokes.
At the conclusion of the test, a new command prompt will appear in the window and
the cursor will respond to keystrokes once again. You may continue to
use applications in other windows while waiting for this test to
complete.
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Sending the test results to IM Tech Support
is the final step in providing the accumulated information for
review. Each of the tests above created a text file with their
results (imping.txt, imtracert.txt, and impathping.txt) in the folder
indicated by the command prompt (where you typed the ping, traceroute, and pingpath commands described above). For example, if the command prompt simply look like "C:\>", the test
output files will be located directly in the root of the "C:" drive in
Windows Explorer. If there is an alternate path at the command
prompt, such as "C:\DOCUMENTS AND SETTINGS\JOHNSMITH>", that's
where the output files will be found. Segments of that path longer than 8 characters might be
shortened to 6 characters (with a "~1"
representing the truncated characters) when displayed at the command prompt, so the path given in the previous example might look
like "C:\DOCUME~1\JOHNSM~1>".
Once you locate the output files, attach them to an email (along
with any details you can provide concerning specific computers at
your location experiencing problems or specific times of day you've noticed
trouble most often, etc.) and send it to [email protected]
for analysis. If you are unable to locate the output files after
completing the tests, contact IM Tech Support for assistance.
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