Online Traceroute: Network Path and Hops

Traceroute

Trace up to 20 hops from the portal server to a validated public IPv4 or IPv6 target.

TTL / HOP LIMIT

How traceroute discovers each hop

Traceroute sends probes with gradually increasing TTL on IPv4 or hop limit on IPv6. When that value expires at a router, the router can return an ICMP time-exceeded response, allowing the path to be observed hop by hop.

ASTERISKS

Missing hops do not automatically mean packet loss

Routers and firewalls can suppress or rate-limit TTL-expired responses while continuing to forward production traffic normally. An asterisk therefore means that the probe received no usable response within the configured wait time, not necessarily that forwarding is broken.

POINT OF VIEW

The path is measured from the portal server

This result is not the route from your computer, office or ISP. It represents the outbound routing perspective of the server hosting Circuito Carioca TI, which can have a completely different transit provider, peering policy and geographic path.

IPv4 / IPv6

The target is resolved before the command runs

For hostnames, the portal resolves A and AAAA records first. If any returned address is private or reserved, the request is rejected. Otherwise the command receives only a validated literal IP and is forced to the corresponding address family.

PROBE PROFILE

Public-service limits keep the test controlled

This page limits the trace to 20 hops, one probe per hop and one second of waiting per probe. Reverse DNS lookup for intermediate hops is disabled. These limits reduce execution time and unnecessary DNS traffic while preserving the route-diagnostic purpose.

Frequently asked questions

Why does traceroute show asterisks?+

A router may not answer the probe within the configured timeout, may rate-limit ICMP responses or may intentionally suppress them. Forwarded traffic can still work normally.

Does this show the route from my own Internet connection?+

No. The trace originates from the server hosting the portal. Your local route can be completely different.

Does the tool support IPv6?+

Yes. IPv6 literals and hostnames that resolve only to public IPv6 addresses are supported. The traceroute command is explicitly forced to IPv6 for those targets.

Why are private addresses blocked?+

A public portal should not provide network-diagnostic access to loopback, private, link-local or reserved destinations reachable from its own server environment.

Why does the tool use the resolved IP instead of the hostname?+

The portal validates DNS results first and then runs traceroute against that validated literal IP. This prevents a second hostname resolution from changing the destination after validation.

Why is reverse DNS disabled for hops?+

Using numeric output makes traces faster, avoids many additional DNS lookups and keeps the result focused on the actual network addresses.

Can a completed traceroute still stop before the destination?+

Yes. Firewalls, filtering, routing behavior and response policies can prevent the final destination or intermediate routers from answering traceroute probes.