Wireshark, formerly known as Ethereal, is one of, if not THE, most powerful tools available for packet and traffic analysis for any kind of network, from the basic Ethernet to WiFi.
I'm using it as a packet recorder for later analysis in my packet transmission error studies. Unfortunately for me, it can extract so much data of the packets that, with the high transmission rate in which I'm working, my hard disk gets full in no time.
Just kidding, you may use some filters to extract only what you need for your work.
I've heard so much about it in other papers and correlated works that I had to take a peek. Well, it didn't surprise me at first glance, but as I would require more especific parameters, it didn't let me down, which is great. It also generates lots of statistics, like transmission time, rate, protocols and so on.
Again, it shows error packets, but doesn't count them; I was going after those errors, but they were so many that I had to build a simple counter for the plaintext translated version of the packet acquisition file.
It's color relation to protocol and possibility to be changed, according to the user needs, are also very helpful, as we can quickly notice when data, management or error packets go through our net.
Different users find other uses for it, just depending on the user's background and imagination.
Dowload it here (just go to download section):
http://www.wireshark.org/Grade: 9 (and half ;) )
Why?
- Missed specific packet counting.
- Some of my 700MB translated files contained hexadecimal data that should not be there...
Have fun!
