What is ping.archlinug.org?

scararch · 2021-05-21 18:45:30

Hi,

I've been an Arch user since 2017. Definitely, I am totally not a 'social' person. I don't use forums, quit (read = detoxed from) social networks in the last 2 years, so excuse me if my first post is not a presentation.

Going straight to the point...

I'm using pi.hole (https://pi-hole.net/) to monitor and block ads/malwares on my network. It's a great way to also see all the DNS call made 'under-the-hood'. So far, I noticed that - from pi.hole admin webpage - ping.archlinux.org was on top of the most resolved domains.

Not having found any information on it on this forum, nor anywhere else, I decided to block it. I did it LESS than 6 hours ago, and this is the result:

https://i.imgur.com/PFXQsRY.png

876 queries.

Question time.

ping.archlinux.org clearly state that it's being used for 'network testing', but does not go into details. Can please someone explain exactly a) what program/service is trying to 'call home'? b) What is the exact reason for this? All is working fine since I blocked it. What is the advantage of having my distro call ping.archlinux.org every 10s~ or so?

Thanks.

PS: actually I found this https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Networ … nnectivity, still is not clear to my why ping.archlinux.org is necessary.

Mod Edit - Replaced oversized image with link.
CoC - Pasting pictures and code

Last edited by Slithery (2021-05-21 19:42:13)

Slithery · 2021-05-21 19:43:28

Welcome to the forums scararch

What don't you understand in the wiki page that you linked to?

GaKu999 · 2021-05-21 19:44:10

That is the network manager equivalent of network-online.target.
You can disable it as stated by the wiki.

In the essence, its a connectivity checker, like the archlinux ntp servers are for ntp.
And ping.archlinux.org is a simple checker, curl `ping.archlinux.org` says it pretty clearly.

Lone_Wolf · 2021-05-22 10:56:37

NetworkManager primarily uses that to determine whether your system connects through a portal[1] where you have to login to access internet or has a direct connection .

For a system that always has a direct connection it's not needed.

NetworkManager seems to be the only network management tool in archlinux repos that does this, you could switch to another tool.

[1] a few examples of such portals
university network
public wifi on airport
hotel network

progandy · 2021-05-22 11:57:36

NetworkManager does two things with this check. First it detects portals, second it detects if the network is restricted to a local LAN or has internet connectivity. For some reason NM think it has to check that so often to update the status icon...

Lone_Wolf wrote:

NetworkManager seems to be the only network management tool in archlinux repos that does this

connman has portal detection as well. https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/network/ … rc/wispr.c

http://ipv4.connman.net/online/status.html / http://ipv6.connman.net/online/status.html

you could switch to another tool.

Or just disable the check in networkmanager, but for a stationary system dhcpcd or systemd-networkd will be just fine.

By the way, browsers do it as well: Firefox has built in portal detection. I imagine Chromium does it, too.

Last edited by progandy (2021-05-22 12:04:56)

Arch Linux

#1 2021-05-21 18:45:30

What is ping.archlinug.org?

#2 2021-05-21 19:43:28

Re: What is ping.archlinug.org?

#3 2021-05-21 19:44:10

Re: What is ping.archlinug.org?

#4 2021-05-22 10:56:37

Re: What is ping.archlinug.org?

#5 2021-05-22 11:57:36

Re: What is ping.archlinug.org?

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