Wireshark-dev: Re: [Wireshark-dev] Dissector Registration Query

From: Guy Harris <guy@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Wed, 23 Jul 2008 19:02:38 -0700

On Jul 23, 2008, at 6:47 PM, Kumar, Hemant wrote:

So that it doesnt happen that any junk UDP packets gets dissected just because it fulfilled initial conditions.

If you can't define initial conditions that can usually distinguish between packets for your protocol and packets not for your protocol and that can be implemented in a dissector, you can't use heuristic dissectors; you will have to let the *user* determine whether packets are for your protocol or not, and specify manually whether to dissect them as your protocol.

This would mean that you would have to define a preference for your protocol so that the user can specify which port or ports should be dissected as your protocol, or that you will have to register your dissector as a dissector that can dissect packets atop UDP with

	dissector_add("udp.port", <handle for your dissector>);

and let the user specify with the "Decode As" menu that packets to or from particular ports should be dissected as your protocol.