This minHour teaches you how to find basic information about a website via Command Prompt on a Windows computer. You can see a website's IP address, the route from your network to the website, and the website's DNS information from within Command Prompt.
Steps
Open Start.
Click the Windows logo in the bottom-left corner of the screen.
Search for Command Prompt.
Type in command prompt to bring up a list of matching results.
Click Command Prompt.
It’s at the top of the Start menu. Doing so will open the Command Prompt window.
Ping the web address you want to check.
You can “ping” the nearest website server to see how far away the server is in milliseconds:
- Type in ping website.com where “website” is your website’s name.
- Press .
- Press again to stop the ping.
Trace the website’s route.
Sending a “traceroute” request to your website will show the route the request takes, documenting any server addresses between you and the website:
- Type in tracert website.com where “website” is the website’s name.
- Press .
- Review the path your request took (sections with asterisks are instances in which the request timed out).
Check the DNS information for the website.
You can see the website’s DNS address, which differs from the IP address, by doing the following:
- Type in nslookup website.com where “website” is the name of the website.
- Press .
- Review the website’s DNS addresses.
Tips
- You can sometimes use a website’s IP address to connect to the website in an environment in which the website itself is blocked.
Warnings
- Most websites use firewalls to block unauthorized access, so the IP address you see for a website may be misleading.