NAME¶
capinfos - Prints information about capture files
SYNOPSIS¶
capinfos [ -a ]
[ -A ] [ -b ]
[ -B ] [ -c ]
[ -C ] [ -d ]
[ -D ] [ -e ]
[ -E ] [ -F ]
[ -h ] [ -H ]
[ -i ] [ -I ]
[ -k ] [ -K ]
[ -l ] [ -L ]
[ -m ] [ -M ]
[ -n ] [ -N ]
[ -o ] [ -p ]
[ -P ] [ -q ]
[ -Q ] [ -r ]
[ -R ] [ -s ]
[ -S ] [ -t ]
[ -T ] [ -u ]
[ -v ] [ -x ]
[ -y ] [ -z ]
<infile> ...
capinfos -h|--help
capinfos -v|--version
DESCRIPTION¶
Capinfos is a program that reads one or more capture files
and returns some or all available statistics (infos) of each
<infile> in one of two types of output formats: long or
table.
The long output is suitable for a human to read. The table output
is useful for generating a report that can be easily imported into a
spreadsheet or database.
The user specifies what type of output (long or table) and which
statistics to display by specifying flags (options) that corresponding to
the report type and desired infos. If no options are specified,
Capinfos will report all statistics available in "long"
format.
Options are processed from left to right order with later options
superseding or adding to earlier options.
Capinfos is able to detect and read the same capture files
that are supported by Wireshark. The input files don’t need a
specific filename extension; the file format and an optional gzip, zstd or
lz4 compression will be automatically detected. Near the beginning of the
DESCRIPTION section of wireshark(1) or
<https://www.wireshark.org/docs/man-pages/wireshark.html> is a
detailed description of the way Wireshark handles this, which is the
same way Capinfos handles this.
OPTIONS¶
-a
Displays the timestamp of the earliest packet in the
capture. The earliest packet in the capture is not necessarily the first
packet in the capture - if packets exist "out-of-order", time-wise,
in the capture, Capinfos detects this.
-A
Generate all infos. By default Capinfos will
display all infos values for each input file, but enabling any of the
individual display infos options will disable the generate all option.
-b
Separate infos with ASCII SPACE (0x20) characters. This option is
only useful when generating a table style report (-T). The various info
values will be separated (delimited) from one another with a single ASCII
SPACE character.
Note
Since some of the header labels as well as some
of the value fields contain SPACE characters. This option is of limited value
unless one of the quoting options (-q or -Q) is also specified.
-B
Separate the infos with ASCII TAB characters. This option
is only useful when generating a table style report (-T). The various info
values will be separated (delimited) from one another with a single ASCII TAB
character. The TAB character is the default delimiter when -T style report is
enabled.
-c
Displays the number of packets in the capture file.
-C
Cancel processing any additional files if and when Capinfos
fails to open an input file or gets an error reading an input file. By
default Capinfos will continue processing files even if it gets an
error opening or reading a file.
Note: An error message will be written to stderr whenever
Capinfos fails to open a file or gets an error reading from a file
regardless whether the -C option is specified or not. Upon exit,
Capinfos will return an error status if any errors occurred during
processing.
-d
Displays the total length of all packets in the file, in
bytes. This counts the size of the packets as they appeared in their original
form, not as they appear in this file. For example, if a packet was originally
1514 bytes and only 256 of those bytes were saved to the capture file (if
packets were captured with a snaplen or other slicing option), Capinfos
will consider the packet to have been 1514 bytes.
-D
Displays a count of the number of decryption secrets in
the file. This information is not available in table format.
-e
Displays the timestamp of the latest packet in the
capture. The latest packet in the capture is not necessarily the last packet
in the capture
•if packets exist "out-of-order",
time-wise, in the capture, Capinfos detects this.
-E
Displays the per-file encapsulation of the capture
file.
-F
Displays additional capture file information.
-h|--help
Print the version number and options and exit.
-H
Displays the SHA256 and SHA1 hashes for the file. SHA1
output may be removed in the future.
-i
Displays the average data rate, in bits/sec
-I
Displays detailed capture file interface information.
This information is not available in table format.
-k
Displays the capture comment. For pcapng files, this is
the comment from the section header block.
-K
Use this option to suppress printing capture comments. By
default capture comments are enabled. Capture comments are relatively freeform
and might contain embedded new-line characters and/or other delimiting
characters making it harder for a human or machine to easily parse the
Capinfos output. Excluding capture comments can aid in post-processing
of output.
-l
Display the snaplen (if any) for a file. snaplen (if
available) is determined from the capture file header and by looking for
truncated records in the capture file.
-L
Generate long report. Capinfos can generate two
different styles of reports. The "long" report is the default style
of output and is suitable for a human to use.
-m
Separate the infos with comma (,) characters. This option
is only useful when generating a table style report (-T). The various info
values will be separated (delimited) from one another with a single comma
"," character.
-M
Print raw (machine readable) values in long reports. By
default Capinfos prints numeric values with human-readable SI suffixes,
and shows human-readable file type and encapsulation. Table reports (-T)
always print raw values.
-n
Displays a count of the number of resolved IPv4 addresses
and a count of the number of resolved IPv6 addresses in the file. This
information is not available in table format.
-N
Do not quote the infos. This option is only useful when
generating a table style report (-T). Excluding any quoting characters around
the various values and using a TAB delimiter produces a very "clean"
table report that is easily parsed with CLI tools. By default infos are
NOT quoted.
-o
Displays "True" if packets exist in strict
chronological order or "False" if one or more packets in the capture
exists "out-of-order" time-wise.
-p
Display individual packet comments. It is recommended to
print raw values (-M) when using this option as packet comments may include
newlines and other special characters.
-P
Disable displaying individual packet comments.
-q
Quote infos with single quotes ('). This option is only
useful when generating a table style report (-T). When this option is enabled,
each value will be encapsulated within a pair of single quote (') characters.
This option (when used with the -m option) is useful for generating one type
of CSV style file report.
-Q
Quote infos with double quotes ("). This option is
only useful when generating a table style report (-T). When this option is
enabled, each value will be encapsulated within a pair of double quote
(") characters. This option (when used with the -m option) is useful for
generating the most common type of CSV style file report.
-r
Do not generate header record. This option is only useful
when generating a table style report (-T). If this option is specified then
no header record will be generated within the table report.
-R
Generate header record. This option is only useful when
generating a table style report (-T). A header is generated by default. A
header record (if generated) is the first line of data reported and includes
labels for all the columns included within the table report.
-s
Displays the size of the file, in bytes. This reports the
size of the capture file itself.
-S
Display the earliest and latest packet timestamps as
seconds since January 1, 1970. Handy for synchronizing dumps using editcap
-t.
-t
Displays the capture type of the capture file.
-T
Generate a table report. A table report is a text file
that is suitable for importing into a spreadsheet or database. Capinfos
can build a tab delimited text file (the default) or several variations on
Comma-separated values (CSV) files.
-u
Displays the capture duration, in seconds. This is the
difference in time between the earliest packet seen and latest packet
seen.
-v|--version
Print the full version information and exit.
-x
Displays the average packet rate, in packets/sec
-y
Displays the average data rate, in bytes/sec
-z
Displays the average packet size, in bytes
DIAGNOSTIC OPTIONS¶
--log-level <level>
Set the active log level. Supported levels in lowest to
highest order are "noisy", "debug", "info",
"message", "warning", "critical", and
"error". Messages at each level and higher will be printed, for
example "warning" prints "warning", "critical",
and "error" messages and "noisy" prints all messages.
Levels are case insensitive.
--log-fatal <level>
Abort the program if any messages are logged at the
specified level or higher. For example, "warning" aborts on any
"warning", "critical", or "error"
messages.
--log-domains <list>
Only print messages for the specified log domains, e.g.
"GUI,Epan,sshdump". List of domains must be comma-separated. Can be
negated with "!" as the first character (inverts the match).
--log-debug <list>
Force the specified domains to log at the
"debug" level. List of domains must be comma-separated. Can be
negated with "!" as the first character (inverts the match).
--log-noisy <list>
Force the specified domains to log at the
"noisy" level. List of domains must be comma-separated. Can be
negated with "!" as the first character (inverts the match).
--log-fatal-domains <list>
Abort the program if any messages are logged for the
specified log domains. List of domains must be comma-separated.
--log-file <path>
Write log messages and stderr output to the specified
file.
EXAMPLES¶
To see a description of the options use:
To generate a long form report for the capture file mycapture.pcap
use:
To generate a TAB delimited table form report for the capture file
mycapture.pcap use:
capinfos -T mycapture.pcap
To generate a CSV style table form report for the capture file
mycapture.pcap use:
capinfos -T -m -Q mycapture.pcap
or
capinfos -TmQ mycapture.pcap
To generate a TAB delimited table style report with just the
filenames, capture type, capture encapsulation type and packet count for all
the pcap files in the current directory use:
capinfos -T -t -E -c *.pcap
or
Note: The ability to use of filename globbing characters are a
feature of *nix style command shells.
To generate a CSV delimited table style report of all infos for
all pcap files in the current directory and write it to a text file called
mycaptures.csv use:
capinfos -TmQ *.pcap >mycaptures.csv
The resulting mycaptures.csv file can be easily imported into
spreadsheet applications.
AUTHORS¶
Original Author
Ian Schorr <ian[AT]ianschorr.com>
Contributors
Gerald Combs <gerald[AT]wireshark.org>
Jim Young <jyoung[AT]gsu.edu>