Ping bandwidth cost and ways to keep a GSM connection alive

Logicien · ping -f -I ppp0 -i 1 96.23.2.145

Hi,
I use a GSM modem to connect to Internet. I can get disconnected if the idle time is to long. In that case I often need to unplug the modem to reconnect. During my connection time, there is often a delay to access a site if I wait to long between two requests.

I just come to try the ping command to keep my connection, my link alive between my Gentoo machine and my ISP server. From the moment a ping echo succeed, all subsequents one succeed too. Than, I do not suffer any delay, and probably any disconnection, anymore.

eccerr0r · Posted: Mon May 14, 2012 3:08 pm Post subject:

You're doing what your provider does not want you to do, which is stay connected the whole time.

Ping packets are fairly small at least. You have to ping out of the network to your ISP's machine that keeps track of activity, so you'll have to test. Probably that first hop is OK.

Ping sends some packets out, and get a couple back in, it's probably on the order of 0.1KB/sec if you ping a standard packet every second.

I've found that dropouts due to interference of radio signal (out of range, shielded, etc.) can also cause a disconnect...
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Logicien · Posted: Tue May 15, 2012 10:07 am Post subject:

Your probably right eccerr0r. If my ISP want to count the ping as data transfer, it must be from local network to Internet and then back to local network. I am not complely sure if a local ping cannot be count as a transfer data. It can be log at least.

I can reduce the amount of data send to zero by using the -s switch of the ping command. According to the ping output, each echo request per second send 28 bytes. So 28 x 60 x 60 x 24 = 2419200 bytes per day, divided by 1024 give 2,362 megabytes per day of data transfer in upload. I do not know how much it is in download. Probably it is configurable by the machine who is being ping. For me, it is enough economic because it keep my connection continuously alive and I can stop it anytime.

My command is