Test Network Connection

Test Network Connection

If you are having trouble connecting your client computer to your server computer, the first step is to make sure the network is set up properly so both computers can “see” on another. To do this, we will perform a Ping test.

A Ping test uses the command prompt, which is a tool built into Windows. This tool will allow us to “ping” the server computer to test if a connection can be made.

First, you will need to get the IP address of the OrderTrac server computer. To find your server’s IP address, open up OrderTrac on the server computer, and click Network, then Client/Server Info.

open network info
Open Client/Server Info

Once the Client/Server info dialog is displayed, write down the Server IP address.

client server info
Note the Server IP Address

Now that you know the server IP address, click the Start button, and type “CMD”, and click Enter. This will open the command prompt. Alternatively, you can open the Start menu, and search for Command Prompt under Accessories.

Open command prompt
Open the command prompt

Once the command prompt is open, type “ping [server-ip-address]”. So if your server IP address is 192.168.10.13, you would type “ping 192.168.10.13”, as seen below by the number 1. Now hit the Enter key.

ping results sucess
Successful ping connection

View your results and look for the line that says: “Packets: Set = x, Received = x, Lost = x <x% loss> as shown above by the #2. If your results look like the example above and say 0% loss, then the connection was successful and the client computer was successfully able to “talk” to the server computer.

ping results fail
Connection failure ping results

However, if your results look more like this example, and say 100% loss, then there was NOT a successful connection, and the client computer is unable to see the server computer.Reasons could include:

Try the following:
1. Make sure both client and server computers are on the same network connection. If one is a laptop and is using WiFi, make sure the the wifi is connected.
2. Verify your network equipment is working properly. Try re-setting your router and modem.
3. Contact your network administrator if you have one to see if they can help diagnose your connection issues.

If the ping results indicated a successful connection, try following this guide to get your client connected to your server.