diff options
author | Guy Harris <guy@alum.mit.edu> | 2005-12-09 02:59:36 +0000 |
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committer | Guy Harris <guy@alum.mit.edu> | 2005-12-09 02:59:36 +0000 |
commit | e28c8a0c82a92c0572f5510bf0c47b30d5ed5916 (patch) | |
tree | 77a9637d1e54b0e3a73c9a94c2bb21695bb600ab /doc | |
parent | b45d2efe6db49becb5bb1b5b27fbca9948b785c5 (diff) |
Repeatedly indicate that "-w" is for writing binary packet data, and
that if you want to send text to a file, just redirect the standard
output. I've seen at least one message on the Ethereal lists from
somebody who didn't realize that, and I think I've seen more.
svn path=/trunk/; revision=16737
Diffstat (limited to 'doc')
-rw-r--r-- | doc/tethereal.pod | 28 |
1 files changed, 18 insertions, 10 deletions
diff --git a/doc/tethereal.pod b/doc/tethereal.pod index 12460b1b10..ad26522a3b 100644 --- a/doc/tethereal.pod +++ b/doc/tethereal.pod @@ -135,19 +135,25 @@ B<Tethereal> is also capable of reading any of these file formats if they are compressed using gzip. B<Tethereal> recognizes this directly from the file; the '.gz' extension is not required for this purpose. -If the B<-w> flag is not specified, B<Tethereal> prints a decoded form -of the packets it captures or reads; otherwise, it writes those packets -to the file specified by that flag. +If the B<-w> flag is not specified, B<Tethereal> writes to the standard +output the text of a decoded form of the packets it captures or reads. +If the B<-w> flag is specified, B<Tethereal> writes to the file +specified by that flag the raw data of the packets, along with the +packets' time stamps. -When printing a decoded form of packets, B<Tethereal> prints, by +When writing a decoded form of packets, B<Tethereal> writes, by default, a summary line containing the fields specified by the preferences file (which are also the fields displayed in the packet list -pane in B<Ethereal>), although if it's printing packets as it captures -them, rather than printing packets from a saved capture file, it won't -print the "frame number" field. If the B<-V> flag is specified, it -prints instead a view of the details of the packet, showing all the +pane in B<Ethereal>), although if it's writing packets as it captures +them, rather than writting packets from a saved capture file, it won't +show the "frame number" field. If the B<-V> flag is specified, it +writes instead a view of the details of the packet, showing all the fields of all protocols in the packet. +If you want to write the decoded form of packets to a file, run +B<Tethereal> without the B<-w> flag, and redirect its standard output to +the file (do I<not> use the B<-w> flag). + When writing packets to a file, B<Tethereal>, by default, writes the file in B<libpcap> format, and writes all of the packets it sees to the output file. The B<-F> flag can be used to specify the format in which @@ -327,7 +333,8 @@ Set the capture filter expression. =item -F Set the file format of the output capture file written using the B<-w> -flag. +flag. The output written with the B<-w> flag is raw packet data, not +text, so there is no B<-F> option to request text output. =item -h @@ -504,7 +511,8 @@ than a one-line summary of the packet. =item -w Write raw packet data to I<savefile> or to the standard output if -I<savefile> is "-". +I<savefile> is "-". NOTE: this is raw packet data, not text; if you +want text output, don't use the B<-w> flag. =item -x |