Looking for a way to see what is where on the net? Wondering just why the page you're trying to reach is so slow? Would you like to visually comprehend the distances involved in net traffic? Look no further than Neotrace!

This tool was recommended by my ISP, and I have found it useful for many different things. Tracking down junk mail is one major point in my current online activities. Getting the best game server and finding alternate download locations are others. I can only guess at the various uses for this remarkable tool - like network health, locating customers/subscribers, network load/planning and security.

The latest version (2.02) includes geophysical mapping, locating on a modified Mercator projection each node along the route. Nodes that report geographic data - from RFC 1876 - show as different symbols than those derived from Zip code or address information. You also have the ability to add locations stored in a local file.

Features include the ability to ping 5 separate traces at once, graphical nodelist, tabular nodelist (exportable) and minimum/maximum/average display of ping times for each node. You can configure the display of nodes, latency, how often to ping, sounds and others. All of the screens and configuration dialogs are shown on the web site.

I applaud Neoworx's stance on spam. There is a simple tutorial on looking at email headers, just the thing for tracing that multilevel marketing spiel, after getting it the tenth time. The tool is easy to use and great fun, also. The things you can look up are amazing! After tracing a few addresses like my ISP, I decided to look up something really interesting: lamartin.com. The network info? I leave that exercise up to you. Hint: it has something to do with Constantinople...

Neotrace is currently 1.13MB and sells for $29.95.

Related links:

http://www.neoworx.com/
http://www.neotrace.com/neotrace/spam.asp
http://www.cauce.org/
http://www.cybergeography.org/mapping.html u