Version 21 of sockspy

Author of this application is Tom Poindexter and Keith Vetter.

sockspy [L1 ] "watch[es] the conversation of a Tcp client and server", according to its quite readable README [L2 ]. Although "not a replacement for heavy duty tools such as 'tcpdump' and other passive packet sniffers" (Ethereal [L3 ], ...), it's easy to install, configure, and launch, and pleasingly convenient for "debugging Tcp client/server programs, examining protocols and diagnosing network problems".

sockspy is nearly indispensable for any network programmer or network administrator, quite apart from any interest they might have in Tcl. [Compare to tcpdump, ...]

Version 2.0 of sockspy is available on sourceforge at [L4 ]. [L5 ] documents sockspy.

Among the new features are:

reorganized GUI to use one pane and different colors to indicate client, server and meta data
can be run as a command-line (tcl not tk) application. Before 2.0, sockspy was inherently Tk
you can stop, start and change the socket forwarding configuration from within the application

Keith has also updated [L6 ] Tom's version 1.0 tutorial.

Sebastian Wangnick has an interesting complement to sockspy he calls ipc. [Also explain relations to sniffers--tcpdump, ethereal, ..., and pktsrc ] [Also moni.]

CL plans a couple of articles (late?) in 2002 on sockspy applications.

Category Application