This README file is in -*- text -*- mode, because Emacs likes it that way. This is the third release, actually numbered 0.04, of a whole bunch of Perl modules which I have named NetPacket::*. These modules do basic disassembly of network packets of various Internet protocols. NetPacket 0.01 contained hooks for assembly of packets which have been implemented in this version by Stephanie Wehner . I've used these scripts for a variety of little jobs such as snooping various TCP services, gathering network traffic statistics by source/destination/protocol, and for unpacking the contents of IP tunnels. They're actually pretty useful. I recommend fetching and installing the Net::Pcap module to actually gather packet data, and for writing small scripts based on packet capture, the Net::PcapUtils module is also useful. At present, decoding for the following protocols has been implemented. - Ethernet (802.3 and 802.2) - ARP - ICMP - IGMP - IP - UDP - TCP It's pretty easy to add new protocols. Just copy one of the existing modules and figure out an unpack string which will unpack the information in the packet and store the data into fields in the namespace of the NetPacket::whatever object. More information can be found in the NetPacket(3) manpage, which is the base class module. I'd be interested in receiving bug reports, comments or any improvements (especially additional protocols) to the NetPacket modules. Tim Potter 30th July, 2001 tpot@samba.org History ------- v0.04: Checksum offset fix, thanks to J. Hoagland for pointing this out.