The Daily App: Visual Traceroute for Android

Mobile devices now give developers the ability to mashup so many different technology features and functions that we see really nifty new apps just about every day.

Visual Traceroute for Android brings a great idea to mobile devices: the ability to trace the path your data takes from your device to another server. A free download from the Android Market, by developer Ryan ZA, Visual Traceroute works quickly and effectively.

According to the developer’s online app description: “Visual Traceroute will use the 'ping' command available on most devices to determine the path your data travels, and will then use a database to look up the geographic location of this path.”

The app relies upon geolocation software by another developer, MaxMind. On a country-by-country basis, Visual Traceroute provides 95 percent accuracy the developer says. However, drilling down to a city-level view, that accuracy drops. Still, by providing information about which global geographies are on your data’s route, it could be come easy to check on issues which could impact items like performance or even compliance. We believe this technology will improve and we like what Visual Traceroute does for free. It’s worth a look.