The Tracert Short Story - Geek Humor

If you want to know how badly lagged you are when you play a game, or if you're potentially having your web traffic hijacked, there is a command that can help.

It's called a Trace Route.  In windows, you run it from the command prompt, A.K.A "The Dark Place".  You type in tracert then the IP address or the url you want to follow. 

You'll get a lot of stuff that you may need some help to read but it will tell you the following -

The number of "hops" or computers you pass through to get to the next step.
The time it took to go from point A to point B.
The IP Address and the URL of the destination.

Someone had a little fun.

You see you have a lot of latitude in naming those routers that are out there.  Apparently people weren't checking to see what people were calling them.   Someone figured that out and decided to name them oddly.

They pieced them together and made a story.

So if you went to Start, Accessories, Command Prompt and typed

tracert 216.81.59.173 

You get the following results.  Or at least I did when I typed the stuff in at 750AM ion Sunday Feb 10, 2013.  If you miss the story, jump to step 12 and read the words in Italics.

Microsoft Windows [Version 6.1.7601]
Copyright (c) 2009 Microsoft Corporation.  All rights reserved.

C:\Users\Bill>tracert 216.81.59.173

Tracing route to FIN [216.81.59.173]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

  1     2 ms    <1 192.168.1.1="" br="" ms="" nbsp="">  2    27 ms    43 ms    69 ms  (My address was here, sorry folks)111
  3    25 ms    23 ms    26 ms  xe-9-2-0-0-sur03.pompanobeach.fl.pompano.comcast
.net [68.86.163.129]
  4    27 ms    27 ms    27 ms  te-0-1-0-2-ar03.northdade.fl.pompano.comcast.net
 [68.87.162.217]
  5    50 ms    35 ms    36 ms  he-2-7-0-0-cr01.miami.fl.ibone.comcast.net [68.8
6.93.81]
  6    29 ms    29 ms    22 ms  pos-0-0-0-0-pe01.nota.fl.ibone.comcast.net [68.8
6.87.102]
  7    27 ms    27 ms    26 ms  66.208.233.18
  8    42 ms    41 ms    47 ms  xe-2-1-0.atl11.ip4.tinet.net [89.149.184.21]
  9    45 ms   106 ms    44 ms  epik-networks-gw.ip4.tinet.net [77.67.69.158]
 10    52 ms    53 ms    51 ms  po0-3.dsr2.atl.epikip.net [216.81.59.2]
 11     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 12   104 ms    93 ms    87 ms  Episode.IV [206.214.251.1]
 13    97 ms    90 ms    91 ms  A.NEW.HOPE [206.214.251.6]
 14    88 ms    89 ms    90 ms  It.is.a.period.of.civil.war [206.214.251.9]
 15    90 ms    93 ms    88 ms  Rebel.spaceships [206.214.251.14]
 16    88 ms    87 ms    88 ms  striking.from.a.hidden.base [206.214.251.17]
 17    89 ms    91 ms    89 ms  have.won.their.first.victory [206.214.251.22]
 18    90 ms    88 ms    93 ms  against.the.evil.Galactic.Empire [206.214.251.25
]
 19    89 ms    88 ms     *     During.the.battle [206.214.251.30]
 20    89 ms    90 ms    93 ms  Rebel.spies.managed [206.214.251.33]
 21    89 ms    95 ms    90 ms  to.steal.secret.plans [206.214.251.38]
 22    96 ms    90 ms    93 ms  to.the.Empires.ultimate.weapon [206.214.251.41]

 23    92 ms    94 ms    89 ms  the.DEATH.STAR [206.214.251.46]
 24    94 ms   104 ms   103 ms  an.armored.space.station [206.214.251.49]
 25    96 ms    88 ms    93 ms  with.enough.power.to [206.214.251.54]
 26   107 ms    93 ms    96 ms  destroy.an.entire.planet [206.214.251.57]
 27  2194 ms    83 ms   117 ms  Pursued.by.the.Empires [206.214.251.62]
 28    91 ms    91 ms    91 ms  sinister.agents [206.214.251.65]
 29    90 ms    90 ms    90 ms  Princess.Leia.races.home [206.214.251.70]
 30   104 ms    88 ms    92 ms  aboard.her.starship [206.214.251.73]

Trace complete.

C:\Users\Bill>