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hustwei's avatar
hustwei
Icon for Nimbostratus rankNimbostratus
May 28, 2024

what's the difference between gateway_icmp and icmp in the BIG-IP monitors?

what's the difference between gateway_icmp and icmp in the BIG-IP monitors? 

  • The gateway_icmp monitor is pretty much a template that's intended to be used with "transparent mode" monitor configuration, where you should tune it to ping a specific IP address.

    If you don't specify transparent mode, and just use it as-is with the default template configuration, then it will still refer your LTM object IP address, essentially working the same as the icmp monitor. 

    For LTM pool objects, since every pool member is a combination of an <IP address : port> socket, the use of icmp monitor was disallowed since it won't be a reliable tool for checking service status, as it's just probing the host where the service runs on; while gateway_icmp is allowed as it makes sense that there might be dependancies on specific IP addresses (where the monitor is configured in transparent mode, checking different hosts). 

  • I see the gatewate_icmp can use the Alias Service Port , how can icmp monitor a port?

    • CA_Valli's avatar
      CA_Valli
      Icon for MVP rankMVP

      Alias port is not going to matter on gateway_icmp monitor, as ICMP functions over IP protocol. 

      It's implemented because higher-layers monitors like TCP or HTTP can be transparent too, and you can configure them to send probes on different ports as well.