Wireshark-bugs: [Wireshark-bugs] [Bug 11733] Interface list doesn't show well when the list is v

Date: Fri, 08 Jan 2016 08:34:42 +0000

Comment # 2 on bug 11733 from
(In reply to Roland Knall from comment #1)
> Not only that, but the sorting is also completely off. It should sort
> alphabetical by interface name, which it actually does not.

No, it should sort interfaces by the order in which libpcap/WinPcap provides
them; libpcap/WinPcap go through some effort to put the more useful interfaces
at the top - to quote the comment in libpcap for the routine that calculates
the figure of merit for an interface:

 * The figure of merit, which is lower the "better" the interface is,   
 * has the uppermost bit set if the interface isn't running, the bit
 * below that set if the interface isn't up, the bit below that set
 * if the interface is a loopback interface, and the interface index
 * in the 29 bits below that.  (Yes, we assume u_int is 32 bits.)

Interfaces that aren't up really belong below interfaces that are up, and, once
that's done, loopback interfaces belong below non-loopback interfaces.

No, there's no API in libpcap to get its figure of merit value, but if you just
assign a figure of merit value of N-1 to the Nth interface in the list you get
from libpcap and sort by *that* value by default, you'll get the most useful
interfaces at the top.

Not only should the list in the main window be sorted that way, the list in
Capture -> Options  should be sorted that way.

On my Mac, I *really* don't want to see awdl0 (Apple Wireless Direct Link) or
bridge0 (Thunderbolt bridge) before en0; en0 is the interface on which I'm most
likely to want to capture.


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