Dr. Watson's SNMP is based on the Epilogue Technologies' SNMP engine, the most widely deployed SNMP engine in commercial products. Dr. Watson's SNMP has been extensively tested and Empirical was one of the participants in InterWorking Lab's SNMP Test Summit. A reachability test determines whether it is possible to send a packet from one point on the network to another. Most network problems are the result of either total or partial reachability failures. These failures occur due to equipment failures, cable noise, equipment mis-configuration, etc.
Ping is very lightweight, causing very little network or CPU overhead.
However, ping tests a significant portion of overall network functionality. Dr. Watson's ping is much more powerful than the version found on typical Unix workstations. Dr. Watson's ping can use ICMP, UDP, or SNMP as the underlying protocol. Dr. Watson's version gives the user control over a large number of operational parameters including the packet rate, the packet size, the data pattern included in the packet, the reporting interval, and the underlying protocol to use. Dr. Watson's ping also checks that the data which it receives from the server is a correct copy of that which was sent.