Network diagnostics with Go
Dr. Wireless
© Lead Image © Ewa Walicka, Fotolia.com
Why is the WiFi not working? Instead of always typing the same steps to diagnose the problem, Mike Schilli writes a tool in Go that puts the wireless network through its paces and helps isolate the cause.
Imagine you've just arrived at your vacation resort, and the WiFi isn't working. Is the router's DHCP server failing to assign an IP address to your laptop? Is it DNS? Or is it just that the throughput is so poor that everything seems to be stalling?
You can diagnose all of these issues by running various command-line tools, but it is tedious and annoying to have to repeat the procedure every time. How about a tool that repeatedly runs these steps at regular intervals, visualizes the results, and hopefully zeroes in on the root cause?
I will use the tview [1] library from GitHub as the terminal user interface (UI) for my wifi diagnostic tool. After all, some well-known projects, such as Kubernetes, also use it for their command-line tools. With just a few lines of code, tview switches the current terminal to raw mode and displays simple graphical elements such as tables or forms in a retro white on black background style0 (Figure 1). It accepts keyboard input in raw mode, and applications can use it to control actions on the interface.
[...]
Buy this article as PDF
(incl. VAT)
Buy Linux Magazine
US / Canada
UK / Australia
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Support Our Work
Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you’ve found an article to be beneficial.
News
-
Red Hat Releases RHEL 10 Early
Red Hat quietly rolled out the official release of RHEL 10.0 a bit early.
-
openSUSE Joins End of 10
openSUSE has decided to not only join the End of 10 movement but it also will no longer support the Deepin Desktop Environment.
-
New Version of Flatpak Released
Flatpak 1.16.1 is now available as the latest, stable version with various improvements.
-
IBM Announces Powerhouse Linux Server
IBM has unleashed a seriously powerful Linux server with the LinuxONE Emperor 5.
-
Plasma Ends LTS Releases
The KDE Plasma development team is doing away with the LTS releases for a good reason.
-
Arch Linux Available for Windows Subsystem for Linux
If you've ever wanted to use a rolling release distribution with WSL, now's your chance.
-
System76 Releases COSMIC Alpha 7
With scores of bug fixes and a really cool workspaces feature, COSMIC is looking to soon migrate from alpha to beta.
-
OpenMandriva Lx 6.0 Available for Installation
The latest release of OpenMandriva has arrived with a new kernel, an updated Plasma desktop, and a server edition.
-
TrueNAS 25.04 Arrives with Thousands of Changes
One of the most popular Linux-based NAS solutions has rolled out the latest edition, based on Ubuntu 25.04.
-
Fedora 42 Available with Two New Spins
The latest release from the Fedora Project includes the usual updates, a new kernel, an official KDE Plasma spin, and a new System76 spin.