# Inspecting the Fabric and Mesh **URL:** \ **Category:** Ziti Overlay\ **Created:** [October 12, 2024, 2:14am UTC](https://openziti.discourse.group/t/inspecting-the-fabric-and-mesh/3234 "2024-10-12T02:14:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![danclay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/87869e/32.png) [@danclay](https://openziti.discourse.group/u/danclay)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2024, 2:14am UTC](https://openziti.discourse.group/t/inspecting-the-fabric-and-mesh/3234/1 "2024-10-12T02:14:37Z")
Hello, I'm new the OpenZiti and have set up 2 routers in clouds to serve as the "mesh" and connected some services geographically distributed. I am connecting wonderfully to services, but I was wondering if there was a way to inspect the full route taken to see the edge router to edge router mesh usage. `ziti fabric list links` and `ziti fabric list circuits` provide some information but I am unsure of how to parse them to visualize routes. ---
**Author:** ![TheLumberjack](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/openziti.discourse.group/thelumberjack/32/113_2.png) [@TheLumberjack](https://openziti.discourse.group/u/TheLumberjack)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2024, 2:23am UTC](https://openziti.discourse.group/t/inspecting-the-fabric-and-mesh/3234/2 "2024-10-12T02:23:17Z")
Hi @danclay, welcome to the community and to OpenZiti (and zrok and browzer)! For better visualizing the circuit, you might try using the ziti admin console (ZAC) and the visualizer? ![visualizer](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/free1/uploads/netfoundry/original/2X/6/6d56311bfbf43053cec9bc198191647fc9137bcc.gif) Other than that, what sort of questions about the circuit do you have? If you want to show me an example, me (or someone) could take a look and answer any questions. Is there something in particular you're wondering about? ---
**Author:** ![danclay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/87869e/32.png) [@danclay](https://openziti.discourse.group/u/danclay)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2024, 2:44am UTC](https://openziti.discourse.group/t/inspecting-the-fabric-and-mesh/3234/3 "2024-10-12T02:44:58Z")
Yup, just checked that out and it has helped. I noticed the ZAC console doesn't seem to show any links between edge routers, is that just visual (attached below)? If so, is there any way to check the existence of the inter-router links? I was most curious of visualizing (mentally or visually) of this type of connectivity and how cost may work with it. For instance, if someone connected to the local-router is connecting to the service, are the options any of: 1. local-router --\> cloud-edge-router1 --\> service-tunnel 2. local-router --\> cloud-edge-router2 --\> service-tunnel 3. local-router --\> cloud-edge-router(1 or 2) --\> cloud-edge-router(1 or 2) --\> service-tunnel If so, what factors determine this? Will rerouting occur if a router clogs up from, say, another endpoint's file transfer? ![image](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/free1/uploads/netfoundry/original/2X/3/39cb63847c66f75b80376fd0d9945cb19305549c.png) ---
**Author:** ![TheLumberjack](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/openziti.discourse.group/thelumberjack/32/113_2.png) [@TheLumberjack](https://openziti.discourse.group/u/TheLumberjack)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2024, 3:47am UTC](https://openziti.discourse.group/t/inspecting-the-fabric-and-mesh/3234/4 "2024-10-12T03:47:34Z")
Let's imagine a complex path, something like: ```auto [r/h-DqbP927]->[l/1qp6LIzSlWkQM1jSSTJG1j]->[l/2td3LAbcdeQM1jSSTJG1j]->[r/Ce1f5dDCey] ``` Here we see a circuit that first - connects to a router with id `h-DqbP927` - traverses the link with id `1qp6LIzSlWkQM1jSSTJG1j` - traverses the link with id `2td3LAbcdeQM1jSSTJG1j` - ends at the router with id `e1f5dDCey`, which offloads the traffic to wherever it's going As for the visualizer, it's not something I've worked on myself. I'll see if I can get someone to comment on that. ---
**Author:** ![danclay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/87869e/32.png) [@danclay](https://openziti.discourse.group/u/danclay)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2024, 4:03am UTC](https://openziti.discourse.group/t/inspecting-the-fabric-and-mesh/3234/5 "2024-10-12T04:03:26Z")
Okay that clarifies the CLI a bit. So if I were to build a complex network and encourage bouncing around routers (maybe modifying costs), I should see the link IDs in the circuit command match up with links containing a router dialer and router acceptor in the link list command? e.g. though the UI doesn't show it, I have a link that shows `3sYbIsNWafVOky34fzrqoD │ router2 │ router1` Does this mean the two routers have formed a mesh? ---
**Author:** ![TheLumberjack](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/openziti.discourse.group/thelumberjack/32/113_2.png) [@TheLumberjack](https://openziti.discourse.group/u/TheLumberjack)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2024, 4:45am UTC](https://openziti.discourse.group/t/inspecting-the-fabric-and-mesh/3234/6 "2024-10-12T04:45:54Z")
Alright, I used our existing docker compose quickstart (which is complicated for these sorts of reasons)... I updated it so that it uses link groups and forced the path and then I made a web request and captured the path. ```auto ╭───────────┬───────────────────────────┬──────────┬────────────────────────┬─────────────────────┬──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮ │ ID │ CLIENT │ SERVICE │ TERMINATOR │ CREATEDAT │ PATH │ ├───────────┼───────────────────────────┼──────────┼────────────────────────┼─────────────────────┼──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤ │ 3IEiiQQiU │ cm25nmh5200fgmumbdejqwxbj │ http.svc │ 6G9M1UCSxvarE6nibEUdlJ │ 2024-10-12 04:32:47 │ r/ziti-edge-router -> l/5oTWKh6Hurr1UaAVacZiHR -> r/ziti-fabric-router-br -> l/20nJKIgwm4byEPDjKu9vkA -> r/ziti-private-blue │ ╰───────────┴───────────────────────────┴──────────┴────────────────────────┴─────────────────────┴──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯ results: 1-1 of 1 ``` ![image](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/free1/uploads/netfoundry/original/2X/d/daab47ee728db8f7ecd2b80a5605bd6bb3991552.png) ```auto $ ziti fabric list links ╭────────────────────────┬───────────────────────┬───────────────────────┬─────────────┬─────────────┬─────────────┬───────────┬────────┬───────────╮ │ ID │ DIALER │ ACCEPTOR │ STATIC COST │ SRC LATENCY │ DST LATENCY │ STATE │ STATUS │ FULL COST │ ├────────────────────────┼───────────────────────┼───────────────────────┼─────────────┼─────────────┼─────────────┼───────────┼────────┼───────────┤ │ 20nJKIgwm4byEPDjKu9vkA │ ziti-private-blue │ ziti-fabric-router-br │ 1 │ 2.1ms │ 2.3ms │ Connected │ up │ 5 │ │ 3TS2LBeqnZjF1XJb7HFr4 │ ziti-private-red │ ziti-edge-router-wss │ 1 │ 1.2ms │ 2.4ms │ Connected │ up │ 4 │ │ 4c2Cumio5vIQv5pdqt8aB1 │ ziti-edge-router-wss │ ziti-edge-router │ 1 │ 1.2ms │ 2.6ms │ Connected │ up │ 4 │ │ 5oTWKh6Hurr1UaAVacZiHR │ ziti-fabric-router-br │ ziti-edge-router │ 1 │ 1.9ms │ 2.5ms │ Connected │ up │ 4 │ │ 63YE0liebUFiOuThOjP5B3 │ ziti-private-red │ ziti-edge-router │ 1 │ 1.5ms │ 2.0ms │ Connected │ up │ 3 │ │ OsLduOUCwykMSa4VfcaWN │ ziti-fabric-router-br │ ziti-edge-router-wss │ 1 │ 1.7ms │ 2.0ms │ Connected │ up │ 4 │ ╰────────────────────────┴───────────────────────┴───────────────────────┴─────────────┴─────────────┴─────────────┴───────────┴────────┴───────────╯ results: 1-6 of 6 ``` So you can see the web request comes into router `r/ziti-edge-router` and traverses the link `5oTWKh6Hurr1UaAVacZiHR ` which is between `ziti-fabric-router-br` and `ziti-edge-router`. Next it traverses the `20nJKIgwm4byEPDjKu9vkA` link which is between `ziti-private-blue` and `ziti-fabric-router-br` It exits the `r/ziti-private-blue` router and goes to the web server ![image](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/free1/uploads/netfoundry/original/2X/a/a6e2f5f8fac0c88e51a45858ae6f120b978121b1.png) ---
**Author:** ![danclay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/87869e/32.png) [@danclay](https://openziti.discourse.group/u/danclay)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2024, 4:57am UTC](https://openziti.discourse.group/t/inspecting-the-fabric-and-mesh/3234/7 "2024-10-12T04:57:04Z")
That makes sense, thanks for the great explanation! ---
**Author:** ![PhilipGriffiths](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/openziti.discourse.group/philipgriffiths/32/341_2.png) [@PhilipGriffiths](https://openziti.discourse.group/u/PhilipGriffiths)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2024, 3:00pm UTC](https://openziti.discourse.group/t/inspecting-the-fabric-and-mesh/3234/8 "2024-10-13T15:00:42Z")
For inspiration, you may be interested in one of the visualisations we provide in the NetFoundry console. ![image](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/free1/uploads/netfoundry/original/2X/4/43f4fdb607e1f62d9ea62d74304e8ca6c50c04a1.jpeg)