If you're looking for a simple network utility app you might want to give Net Swiss Knife a try on your Windows Phone. Net Swiss Knife has four main tools plus access to your Windows Phone network settings.
With Net Swiss Knife you can scan a local network by IP Address, conduct a DNS query, run a WHOIS search and set up a Wake-On-LAN command. Input is straight forward and from the three-dot menu you can access a series of walkthrough tutorials and your Windows Phone network settings.
Net Swiss Knife has the ability for reverse DNS queries and auto WHOIS server selection (just leave the server field blank on the search screen). Queries are also possible to nameservers other than by IP address. There's really not much to Net Swiss Knife but it does what it does well. The app ran smoothly and pulled up search results without delay.
Net Swiss Knife isn't going to be for everyone but if you need a collection of network tools, it might be worth checking out. Net Swiss Knife is a free app for your Windows Phone and you can grab it here at the Windows Phone Marketplace.
Reader comments
Windows Phone Short-take: Net Swiss Knife
1st
*1st loser
I don't really see a usage case for this app, but maybe I just didn't understand the description... How could I use this app?
Just as it is said in the article, it 'isn't going to be for everyone' - basically, the app makes it easy to perform a couple of simple network operations network administrators and people like that often use. If you never tamper with networks, you will probably never find this app useful. I am not an admin myself, I've just found myself in a situation where I had to deal with stuff like this a couple times. So what I say may not be correct and someone might want to correct me.
WOL (Wake-On-LAN) is a command that will wake a computer up over the network (so you don't have to be on the spot to press the button). DNS and whois lookup can be useful when you have the IP address or a domain name (web address) and want to know more - where the server is, what web server is on that particular IP address, who owns the domain name (often including contact details) etc.
I suppose that there could be many more features added (I would, for example, like to have the possiblity to scan the whole range of IP addresses in my network to be able to tell how many and what computers are connected at a given time).
Let's try it