Ethereal-users: Re: [Ethereal-users] Ethereal bug

Note: This archive is from the project's previous web site, ethereal.com. This list is no longer active.

From: Guy Harris <guy@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Wed, 5 Nov 2003 12:03:40 -0800

On Nov 4, 2003, at 4:20 PM, Phant0m`` wrote:

  I’m an assistant of Look ‘n’ Stop Personal Firewall product, and recently had a user come forth and report on the official forum an anomaly with Ethereal 0.9.15c detecting accurate Interfaces when Look ‘n’ Stop GUI is running.

He is running:

- Ethereal 0.9.15c (as mentioned aboved)
- Microsoft Windows 98 Second Edition
- Dial-up (56k)
- WinPcap v3.01a

Well, the last two won't necessarily work together:

	http://winpcap.polito.it/misc/changelog.htm

"Version 3.0 beta, 10 feb 03

	...

	o 	NdisWan support:
o due to the large number of messages reporting problems (blue screens) with VPNs, PPTP and such connections, we have disabled the support for NdisWan adapters. As a consequence, it is not possible to capture from PPP (neither NdisWanIp, nor NdisWanBh, nor NdisWanBfIn/Out...). At the moment we have no plans to fix the problem with VPNs, PPTP, PPP unless we get a generous sponsorship."

More Details:

Look ‘n’ Stop Personal Firewall uses Emulated Drivers for Interfaces, when Look ‘n’ Stop GUI isn’t running Ethereal 0.9.15c sees "PPP Adapter.: PPPMAC”, when Look ‘n’ Stop GUI is running it shows "Unknown: PPPMAC".

The emulated drivers might not work with WinPcap.

Do you believe updating Ethereal 0.9.15c to Ethereal 0.9.16 will fix this users anomaly?

I don't believe that any change to Ethereal whatsoever will fix this problem, as it's almost certainly a WinPcap issue. Ethereal does not include any code to get network interfaces to capture packets; it relies on libpcap/WinPcap, and the OS facilities it uses, to do that.

I suspect that if they tried using WinDump they'd see similar problems, which would mean that it's a WinPcap issue.

If not then how to proceed to fix this anomaly to use Ethereal when Look ‘n’ Stop Personal Firewall is running?

Ask the WinPcap developers:

	http://winpcap.polito.it/contact.htm