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authorGerald Combs <gerald@wireshark.org>2016-08-11 09:10:48 -0700
committerAnders Broman <a.broman58@gmail.com>2016-08-18 04:26:32 +0000
commit635f0a5c2cea2f8156281953f49568e1129debf1 (patch)
treec4f45122db36776fcadb11bf03c1a77d7c068971 /README
parent38a38abc17bc726bbec6b85bafb3db88dde5e5a5 (diff)
Update the README.
The formatting was mostly AsciiDoc-compliant. Take it the rest of the way. Update the list of supported operating sytems, along with other info. Use HTTPS URLs. Remove README.tru64 while we're here. Change-Id: Ibd9cac5d9f3cdcc7de9c9d7052c14e851e108cbe Reviewed-on: https://code.wireshark.org/review/17014 Reviewed-by: Gerald Combs <gerald@wireshark.org> Petri-Dish: Gerald Combs <gerald@wireshark.org> Tested-by: Petri Dish Buildbot <buildbot-no-reply@wireshark.org> Reviewed-by: Anders Broman <a.broman58@gmail.com>
Diffstat (limited to 'README')
-rw-r--r--README107
1 files changed, 56 insertions, 51 deletions
diff --git a/README b/README
index 6ef85151e0..cd371e6e77 100644
--- a/README
+++ b/README
@@ -1,8 +1,8 @@
General Information
-------- -----------
+-------------------
Wireshark is a network traffic analyzer, or "sniffer", for Unix and
-Unix-like operating systems. It uses GTK+, a graphical user interface
+Unix-like operating systems. It uses Qt, a graphical user interface
library, and libpcap, a packet capture and filtering library.
The Wireshark distribution also comes with TShark, which is a
@@ -15,40 +15,41 @@ from the capture.
The official home of Wireshark is
- http://www.wireshark.org
+ https://www.wireshark.org
The latest distribution can be found in the subdirectory
- http://www.wireshark.org/download
+ https://www.wireshark.org/download
Installation
------------
-Wireshark is known to compile and run on the following systems:
-
- - Linux (2.0 and later kernels, various distributions)
- - Solaris (2.5.1 and later)
- - FreeBSD (2.2.5 and later)
- - NetBSD
- - OpenBSD
- - OS X (10.2 and later)
- - HP-UX (10.20, 11.00, 11.11)
- - Sequent PTX v4.4.5 (Nick Williams <njw@sequent.com>)
- - Tru64 UNIX (formerly Digital UNIX) (3.2 and later)
- - Irix (6.5)
- - AIX (4.3.2, with a bit of work)
- - Windows (2003, XP, Vista, 7)
-
-and possibly on other versions of those OSes. It should run on other
-Unix-ish systems without too much trouble.
-
-If you have an older version of the operating systems listed above, it
-might be supported by an older version of Wireshark. In particular,
-Windows 2000 is supported by Wireshark 1.2.x, Windows NT 4.0 is supported by
-Wireshark 0.99.4, and Windows 95, 98, and ME are supported by Ethereal 0.99.0.
-
-NOTE: the Makefile appears to depend on GNU "make"; it doesn't appear to
+The Wireshark project builds and tests regularly on the following platforms:
+
+ - Linux (Ubuntu)
+ - Microsoft Windows
+ - macOS / OS X
+
+Official installation packages are available for Microsoft Windows and
+macOS.
+
+It is available as either a standard or add-on package for many popular
+operating sytems and Linux distributions including Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora,
+CentOS, RHEL, Arch, Gentoo, openSUSE, FreeBSD, DragonFly BSD, NetBSD, and
+OpenBSD.
+
+Additionaly it is available through many third-party packaging systems
+such as pkgsrc, OpenCSW, Homebrew, and MacPorts.
+
+It should run on other Unix-ish systems without too much trouble.
+
+In some cases the current version of Wireshark might not support your
+operating system. This is the case for Windows XP, which is supported by
+Wireshark 1.10 and earlier. In other cases the standard package for
+Wireshark might simply be old. This is the case for Solaris and HP-UX.
+
+NOTE: The Makefile depends on GNU "make"; it doesn't appear to
work with the "make" that comes with Solaris 7 nor the BSD "make".
Both Perl and Python are needed, the former for building the man pages.
@@ -61,7 +62,8 @@ version must be 2.5.1 or greater. Check this with 'flex -V'.
You must therefore install Perl, Python, GNU "make", "flex", and either "bison"
or Berkeley "yacc" on systems that lack them.
-Full installation instructions can be found in the INSTALL file.
+Full installation instructions can be found in the INSTALL file and in the
+Developer's Guide at https://www.wireshark.org/docs/wsdg_html_chunked/
See also the appropriate README.<OS> files for OS-specific installation
instructions.
@@ -136,22 +138,24 @@ Or, if your system has the "script" command installed, you can save
a shell session, including telnet to a file. For example, to a file named
tracefile.out:
+----
$ script tracefile.out
Script started on <date/time>
$ telnet router
..... do your trace, then exit from the router's telnet session.
$ exit
Script done on <date/time>
+----
+Name Resolution
+---------------
-IPv6
-----
-If your operating system includes IPv6 support, wireshark will attempt to
-use reverse name resolution capabilities when decoding IPv6 packets.
+Wireshark will attempt to use reverse name resolution capabilities
+when decoding IPv4 and IPv6 packets.
-If you want to turn off name resolution while using wireshark, start
-wireshark with the "-n" option to turn off all name resolution (including
+If you want to turn off name resolution while using Wireshark, start
+Wireshark with the "-n" option to turn off all name resolution (including
resolution of MAC addresses and TCP/UDP/SMTP port numbers to names), or
with the "-N mt" option to turn off name resolution for all
network-layer addresses (IPv4, IPv6, IPX).
@@ -161,14 +165,10 @@ box using the Preferences item in the Edit menu, selecting "Name
resolution", turning off the appropriate name resolution options,
clicking "Save", and clicking "OK".
-If you would like to compile wireshark without support for IPv6 name
-resolution, use the "--disable-ipv6" option with "./configure". If you
-compile wireshark without IPv6 name resolution, you will still be able to
-decode IPv6 packets, but you'll only see IPv6 addresses, not host names.
-
SNMP
----
+
Wireshark can do some basic decoding of SNMP packets; it can also use
the libsmi library to do more sophisticated decoding, by reading MIB
files and using the information in those files to display OIDs and
@@ -180,21 +180,22 @@ option.
How to Report a Bug
-------------------
-Wireshark is still under constant development, so it is possible that you will
-encounter a bug while using it. Please report bugs at http://bugs.wireshark.org.
+
+Wireshark is under constant development, so it is possible that you will
+encounter a bug while using it. Please report bugs at https://bugs.wireshark.org.
Be sure you enter into the bug:
- 1) the complete build information from the "About Wireshark"
- item in the Help menu or the output of "wireshark -v" for
- Wireshark bugs and the output of "tshark -v" for TShark bugs;
+1. The complete build information from the "About Wireshark"
+ item in the Help menu or the output of "wireshark -v" for
+ Wireshark bugs and the output of "tshark -v" for TShark bugs;
- 2) if the bug happened on Linux, the Linux distribution you were
- using, and the version of that distribution;
+2. If the bug happened on Linux, the Linux distribution you were
+ using, and the version of that distribution;
- 3) the command you used to invoke Wireshark, if you ran
- Wireshark from the command line, or TShark, if you ran
- TShark, and the sequence of operations you performed that
- caused the bug to appear.
+3. The command you used to invoke Wireshark, if you ran
+ Wireshark from the command line, or TShark, if you ran
+ TShark, and the sequence of operations you performed that
+ caused the bug to appear.
If the bug is produced by a particular trace file, please be sure to
attach to the bug a trace file along with your bug description. If the
@@ -208,11 +209,13 @@ trace can be obtained by using your debugger ('gdb' in this example),
the wireshark binary, and the resulting core file. Here's an example of
how to use the gdb command 'backtrace' to do so.
+----
$ gdb wireshark core
(gdb) backtrace
..... prints the stack trace
(gdb) quit
$
+----
The core dump file may be named "wireshark.core" rather than "core" on
some platforms (e.g., BSD systems). If you got a core dump with
@@ -227,5 +230,7 @@ Use at your own risk.
Gerald Combs <gerald@wireshark.org>
+
Gilbert Ramirez <gram@alumni.rice.edu>
+
Guy Harris <guy@alum.mit.edu>