netraf
A Network Analyzer and Traffic Logger.


netraf Project Goals


Following points aren't draft no more! They are more or less implemented.
  • division into three parts:
    • daemon process (netrafd) - capturing packets and analyzing them (according to fully-configurable user-defined filters),
    • daemon process (netrafl) - logging statistics to files,
    • interactive (NCURSES) program (netrafg) showing "what's happening" live, and - in some way - remote control for daemon processes described above,
  • immune to sudden restarts of machine and electric power shortage,
  • ability to log certain network traffic informations (depending on applied filter type):
    • gathering statistics by network interface(s):
      • amount of data (RX and TX) bytes,
      • count of transferred packets and IP packets,
      • count of transferred Broadcast, Multicast and "routed-through" packets,
    • gathering statistics by network MAC addresses:
      • amount of data (RX and TX) bytes per MAC,
      • count of transferred packets and IP packets per MAC,
      • average data rates,
    • gathering statistics by network TCP connections:
      • amount of data (DOWN and UP) bytes per one TCP connection,
      • count of transferred IP packets per connection,
      • average data rates for choosen connection,
    • gathering statistics by network IP addresses:
      • amount of data (IN and OUT) bytes per IP address,
      • count of transferred IP packets,
  • modularized structure witch allow users to write their own filters and logging rules,
  • user-defined filter consist of:
    • source or destination MAC address,
    • source or destination IP address,
    • source or destination TCP/UDP port,
    • network interface to listen on,
    • perl-compatible regular expression to be matched to packet data,
  • user-defined logging rule consist of:
    • whether captured packets should be logged to file,
    • if above is true, what is the period the log-file should be updated,
    • directory path, where the log-file should be stored,

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Copyright © 2005, M.K., T.J., M.S.
netraf is Open Source software, distributed under the terms of the New BSD License.
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