echoping appears to compile and run at least on OSF/1, Solaris, Linux, SunOS,
FreeBSD, IRIX and Ultrix. You do not have to be root to install it.

Check the Makefile if you wish (C compiler, libraries to include, there are
  comments to guide you), 
just type "make",
and copy the "echoping" executable anywhere you want. 

Same thing for the man page echoping.1. (You can do an automatic install 
with "make install" but this depends on the "install" program which is 
not portable.)

You can define the following in the Makefile (in CFLAGS):

HTTP 
HyperText Transport Protocol support

ICP
ICP protocol support (for Squid Web proxy/cache)

TTCP 
T/TCP support if your system supports it (FreeBSD does). See 
   <http://www.noao.edu/~rstevens/ttcp.html>

USE_SIGACTION
Use sigaction instead of signal. On purely BSD systems, such as SunOS or
FreeBSD, this is necessary because we need to change the semantics of
signals. On some systems (Irix, Solaris), do not use this option, because
it will prevent echoping to compile (this is a bug).

If 'echoping -h' fails with "tcp_open: unknown service: http/tcp", add
"http" to the services database (typically /etc/services or a NIS map).
Its value is 80. Or, change HTTP_TCP_PORT in echoping.h from "http" to "www"
or whatever is defined on your system (at least AIX or Solaris have the 
problem). A workaround is to specify the port on the command line:
echoping -h / www.mydomain.org:80

If 'echoping -h' replies with a "404" error while the file really exists,
check first that you use the FQDN of the server on the command line
(this is a consequence of the HTTP 1.1 protocol, not a bug in echoping
and this will show only if the HTTP server uses "virtual hosting").