RIPE Atlas: Latest Results API and Parsing Library

"Latest Results" API

We've created a new API that lets you retrieve up to the ten most recent results of any of your user-defined measurements. RIPE Atlas users can now use these results for a number of purposes without having to write their own scripts to extract this data from the full measurement results.

This new feature could come in useful in a number of different situations, such as:

• Creating a widget for a website that monitors a specific result in near real time, such as ping results from 100 probes around the world toward your own website
• Monitoring your network by setting up an alert based on the average measurement result from the past hour
• Staying aware of a major network event, such as an Internet outage in a certain region
• DNS monitoring of your own domain, with configurable measurements using 10 RIPE Atlas anchors
• Prototyping a script using RIPE Atlas data

RIPE Atlas developers have been using similar data calls for some time in order to create all of the dynamic results available on the RIPE Atlas website, such as the Internet maps and graphs about the state of the RIPE Atlas network.

Several RIPE Atlas graphs use a similar API to fetch latest results, such as this one that shows round-trip times for probes to the k-root name server over IPv6

We thought others would also find this kind of API useful, and in fact some RIPE Atlas users have specifically requested it, so we decided to make it available to everyone.

The latest results API is somewhat similar to the recently introduced Status Checks feature; however, the latest results API can be used for any of the available RIPE Atlas measurements , whereas Status Checks work only with ping measurements (at least for now). In addition, the latest results API does not involve variables and thresholds like Status Checks do; instead, it is meant to be used as raw data that is completely configurable by you, the user. 

Parsing Library

In addition to the new API, we've also developed a parsing library that can be used in combination with latest results as well as the regular measurement results API. This handy library contains a number of parsers that can be used to extract only the relevant data from the full raw data file returned by the API. Many of our users have been creating their own scripts to do this, and we wanted to make their lives easier by making our own examples available.

(If you're curious about the name of the library, check out the explanation and, if you're really curious, learn more .)

We hope you'll try out these two new features and let us know what you think and how you use them in your own operations.

Feedback

We want to hear from you, the user, about the new probe pages – and anything else you have feedback about. Here's how to get in touch with us:

• For general questions about RIPE Atlas, please use the RIPE Atlas mailing list for active RIPE Atlas hosts and interested users, which is also followed and answered by RIPE Atlas developers: ripe-atlas [at] ripe [dot] net

• For specific problems, please open a ticket with atlas [at] ripe [dot] net

• Join the discussion on Twitter @RIPE_Atlas