# text2pcap

## NAME



           text2pcap - Generate a capture file from an ASCII hex dump of
           packets
    


## SYNOPSIS



           **text2pcap**[ **-a**] [ **-b** 2|8|16|64 ] [ **-D**] [ **-e** <ethertype> ] [ **-E**
           <encapsulation type> ] [ **-F** <file format> ] [ **-i** <proto> ] [ **-l**
           <typenum> ] [ **-N** <intf-name> ] [ **-m** <max-packet> ] [ **-o**
           hex|oct|dec|none ] [ **-q**] [ **-r** <regex> ] [ **-s**
           <srcport>,<destport>,<tag> ] [ **-S** <srcport>,<destport>,<ppi> ] [
           **-t** <timefmt> ] [ **-T** <srcport>,<destport> ] [ **-u**
           <srcport>,<destport> ] [ **-4** <srcip>,<destip> ] [ **-6**
           <srcip>,<destip> ] [ **--little-endian**] <_infile_ >|- <_outfile_ >|-
    
           **text2pcap -h|--help**
    
           **text2pcap -v|--version**
    


## DESCRIPTION



           **Text2pcap** is a program that reads in an ASCII hex dump and writes
           the data described into a capture file. **text2pcap** can read hex
           dumps with multiple packets in them, and build a capture file of
           multiple packets. **Text2pcap** is also capable of generating dummy
           Ethernet, IP, and UDP, TCP or SCTP headers, in order to build
           fully processable packet dumps from hex dumps of application-level
           data only.
    
           **Text2pcap** can write the file in several output formats. The **-F**
           flag can be used to specify the format in which to write the
           capture file, **text2pcap -F** provides a list of the available output
           formats. By default, it writes the packets to _outfile_ in the
           **pcapng** file format. **Text2pcap** also supports compression formats,
           which can be specified with the **--compress** options. If that option
           is not given, the the desired compression method, if any, is
           deduced from the extension of _outfile_ ; e.g. if it has the
           extension '.gz', then the output file is compressed to a gzip
           archive.
    
           **Text2pcap** understands many different hex dump formats. The native
           format that **Wireshark** displays in the Packet Bytes pane, copies to
           the clipboard, prints, and saves, and that **tshark** produces with
           the **--hexdump** option is that generated by _od -Ax -tx1 -v_ or
           _hexdump -X -v_. That is, each line must begin with an offset
           describing the position in the packet, each byte is individually
           displayed, with spaces separating the bytes from each other, and
           repeated or all NUL ('\0') lines are not omitted. Hex digits can
           be upper or lowercase. **Text2pcap** can handle other hex dump
           formats, some of which can be automatically detected and some of
           which require enabling options to properly recognize.
    
           Offsets are followed by one or more spaces or tabs separating them
           from the bytes. Offsets optionally can be followed by a single
           colon after the digits. Offsets can be between 3 and 8 digits;
           hexadecimal base (radix) is assumed by default, but they can be in
           octal or decimal - see **-o**. If offsets are in hex, they can be
           preceded by _0x_ or _0X_. Each packet must begin with offset zero, and
           an offset zero indicates the beginning of a new packet. Offset
           values must be correct; an unexpected value causes the current
           packet to be aborted and the next packet start awaited. There is
           also a single packet mode with no offsets; see **-o**.
    
           There is no limit on the width or number of bytes per line, but
           lines with only hex bytes without a leading offset are ignored (in
           other words, line breaks should not be inserted in long lines that
           wrap.) Bytes must be in hex; unlike with offsets (and the
           alternative regex mode mentioned later), other bases such as
           octal, decimal, or binary are unsupported. Byte groups of two to
           four bytes are also supported. By default byte groups are assumed
           to be in network (big-endian) byte order; the **--little-endian**
           option can be used to support little-endian byte order.
    
           Packets may be preceded by a direction indicator ('I' or 'O')
           and/or a timestamp if indicated by the command line (see **-D** and
           **-t**). If both are present, the direction indicator precedes the
           timestamp. The format of the timestamps is specified as a
           mandatory parameter to **-t**. If no timestamp is parsed, in the case
           of the first packet the current system time is used, while
           subsequent packets are written with timestamps one microsecond
           later than that of the previous packet.
    
           Other text in the input data is ignored. Any text before the
           offset is ignored, including email forwarding characters '>'. Any
           text on a line after the bytes is ignored, e.g. an ASCII character
           dump (but see **-a** to ensure that hex digits in the character dump
           are ignored if there is no delimiter between the hex dump and the
           ASCII character translation). Any line where the first
           non-whitespace character is a '#' will be ignored as a comment.
           Some hex dump utilities use a line containing a single '*' to
           indicate omitted lines, either duplicating the previous line or
           entirely consisting of NUL ('\0') bytes; this is not supported.
           Any lines of text between the bytestring lines are considered
           preamble; the beginning of the preamble is scanned for the
           direction indicator and timestamp as mentioned above and otherwise
           ignored.
    
           Any line beginning with #TEXT2PCAP is a directive and options can
           be inserted after this command to be processed by **text2pcap**.
           Currently there are no directives implemented; in the future,
           these may be used to give more fine grained control on the dump
           and the way it should be processed e.g. timestamps, encapsulation
           type etc.
    
           In general, short of these restrictions, **text2pcap** is pretty
           liberal about reading in hex dumps and has been tested with a
           variety of mangled outputs (including being forwarded through
           email multiple times, with limited line wrap etc.)
    
           Here is a sample dump that **text2pcap** can recognize, with optional
           directional indicator and timestamp:
    
               I 2019-05-14T19:04:57Z
               000000 00 0e b6 00 00 02 00 0e b6 00 00 01 08 00 45 00
               000010 00 28 00 00 00 00 ff 01 37 d1 c0 00 02 01 c0 00
               000020 02 02 08 00 a6 2f 00 01 00 01 48 65 6c 6c 6f 20
               000030 57 6f 72 6c 64 21
               000036
    
           **Text2pcap** is also capable of scanning a text input file using a
           custom Perl compatible regular expression that matches a single
           packet. **text2pcap** searches the given file (which must end with
           '\n') for non-overlapping non-empty strings matching the regex.
           Named capturing subgroups, which must match exactly once per
           packet, are used to identify fields to import. The following
           fields are supported in regex mode, one mandatory and three
           optional:
    
               "data"  Actual captured frame data to import
               "time"  Timestamp of packet
               "dir"   Direction of packet
               "seqno" Arbitrary ID of packet
    
           The 'data' field is the captured data, which must be in a selected
           encoding: hexadecimal (the default), octal, binary, or base64 and
           containing no characters in the data field outside the encoding
           set besides whitespace. The 'time' field is parsed according to
           the format in the **-t** parameter. The first character of the 'dir'
           field is compared against a set of characters corresponding to
           inbound and outbound that default to "iI<" for inbound and "oO>"
           for outbound to assign a direction. The 'seqno' field is assumed
           to be a positive integer base 10 used for an arbitrary ID. An
           optional field’s information will only be written if the field is
           present in the regex and if the capture file format supports it.
           (E.g., the pcapng format supports all three fields, but the pcap
           format only supports timestamps.)
    
           Here is a sample dump that the regex mode can process with the
           regex
           '^(?<dir>[<>])\s(?<time>\d+:\d\d:\d\d.\d+)\s(?<data>[0-9a-fA-F]+)$'
           along with timestamp format '%H:%M:%S.%f', directional indications
           of '<' and '>', and hex encoding:
    
               > 0:00:00.265620 a130368b000000080060
               > 0:00:00.280836 a1216c8b00000000000089086b0b82020407
               < 0:00:00.295459 a2010800000000000000000800000000
               > 0:00:00.296982 a1303c8b00000008007088286b0bc1ffcbf0f9ff
               > 0:00:00.305644 a121718b0000000000008ba86a0b8008
               < 0:00:00.319061 a2010900000000000000001000600000
               > 0:00:00.330937 a130428b00000008007589186b0bb9ffd9f0fdfa3eb4295e99f3aaffd2f005
               > 0:00:00.356037 a121788b0000000000008a18
    
           The regex is compiled with multiline support, and it is
           recommended to use the anchors '^' and '$' for best results.
    
           **Text2pcap** also allows the user to read in dumps of
           application-level data and insert dummy L2, L3 and L4 headers
           before each packet. This allows Wireshark or any other full-packet
           decoder to handle these dumps. If the encapsulation type is
           Ethernet, the user can elect to insert Ethernet headers, Ethernet
           and IP, or Ethernet, IP and UDP/TCP/SCTP headers before each
           packet. The fake headers can also be used with the Raw IP, Raw
           IPv4, or Raw IPv6 encapsulations, with the Ethernet header
           omitted. These encapsulation options can be used in both hex dump
           mode and regex mode.
    
           When <_infile_ > or <_outfile_ > are '-', standard input or standard
           output, respectively, are used.
    


## OPTIONS



           -a
    
               Enables ASCII text dump identification. It allows one to
               identify the start of the ASCII text dump and not include it
               in the packet even if it looks like HEX. This parameter has no
               effect in regex mode.
    
               **NOTE:** Do not enable it if the input file does not contain the
               ASCII text dump, or if the ASCII dump is separated from from
               the hex dump by a non-blank delimiter such as |.
    
           -b 2|8|16|64
    
               Specify the base (radix) of the encoding of the packet data in
               regex mode. The supported options are 2 (binary), 8 (octal),
               16 (hexadecimal), and 64 (base64 encoding), with hex as the
               default. This parameter has no effect in hex dump mode.
    
           -D
    
               Indicates that the text before each input packet may start
               either with an I or O indicating that the packet is inbound or
               outbound. If both this flag and the _t_ flag are used, the
               directional indicator is expected before the time code. This
               parameter has no effect in regex mode, where the presence of
               the <dir> capturing group determines whether direction
               indicators are expected.
    
               Direction indication is stored in the packet headers if the
               output format supports it (e.g. pcapng), and is also used when
               generating dummy headers to swap the source and destination
               addresses and ports as appropriate.
    
           -e <ethertype>
    
               Include a dummy Ethernet header before each packet. Specify
               the EtherType for the Ethernet header in hex. Use this option
               if your dump has Layer 3 header and payload (e.g. IP header),
               but no Layer 2 encapsulation. Example: _-e 0x806_ to specify an
               ARP packet.
    
               For IP packets, instead of generating a fake Ethernet header
               you can also use _-E rawip_ or _-l 101_ to indicate raw IP
               encapsulation. Note that raw IP encapsulation does not work
               for any non-IP Layer 3 packet (e.g. ARP), whereas generating a
               dummy Ethernet header with _-e_ works for any sort of L3 packet.
    
           -E <encapsulation type>
    
               Sets the packet encapsulation type of the output capture file.
               **text2pcap -E** provides a list of the available types; note that
               not all file formats support all encapsulation types. The
               default type is ether (Ethernet).
    
               **NOTE:** This sets the encapsulation type of the output file, but
               does not translate the packet headers or add additional
               headers. It is used to specify the encapsulation that matches
               the input data.
    
           -F <file format>
    
               Sets the file format of the output capture file. **Text2pcap** can
               write the file in several formats; **text2pcap -F** provides a
               list of the available output formats. The default is the
               **pcapng** format.
    
           -h|--help
               Print the version number and options and exit.
    
           -i <proto>
    
               Include dummy IP headers before each packet. Specify the IP
               protocol for the packet in decimal. Use this option if your
               dump is the payload of an IP packet (i.e. has complete L4
               information) but does not have an IP header with each packet.
               Note that an appropriate Ethernet header is automatically
               included with each packet as well if the link-layer type is
               Ethernet. Example: _-i 46_ to specify an RSVP packet (IP
               protocol 46). See
               https://www.iana.org/assignments/protocol-numbers/protocol-numbers.xhtml
               for the complete list of assigned internet protocol numbers.
    
           -l <typenum>
    
               Sets the packet encapsulation type of the output capture file,
               using pcap link-layer header type numbers. Default is Ethernet
               (1). See https://www.tcpdump.org/linktypes.html for the
               complete list of possible encapsulations. Example: _-l 7_ for
               ARCNet packets encapsulated BSD-style.
    
           -m <max-packet>
    
               Set the maximum packet length, default is 262144. Useful for
               testing various packet boundaries when only an application
               level datastream is available. Example:
    
               _od -Ax -tx1 -v stream | text2pcap -m1460 -T1234,1234 -_
               _stream.pcap_
    
               will convert from plain datastream format to a sequence of
               Ethernet TCP packets.
    
           -N <intf-name>
               Specify a name for the interface included when writing a
               pcapng format file.
    
           -o hex|oct|dec|none
    
               Specify the radix for the offsets (hex, octal, decimal, or
               none). Defaults to hex. This corresponds to the -A option for
               _od_. This parameter has no effect in regex mode.
    
               **NOTE:** With _-o none_ , only one packet will be created, ignoring
               any direction indicators or timestamps after the first byte
               along with any offsets.
    
           -P <dissector>
    
               Include an EXPORTED_PDU header before each packet. Specify, as
               a string, the dissector to be called for the packet
               (DISSECTOR_NAME tag). Use this option if your dump is the
               payload for a single upper layer protocol (so specifying a
               link layer type would not work) and you wish to create a
               capture file without a full dummy protocol stack.
               Automatically sets the link layer type to Wireshark Upper PDU
               export. Without this option, if the Upper PDU export link
               layer type (252) is selected the dissector defaults to "data".
    
           -q
               Don’t display the summary of the options selected at the
               beginning, or the count of packets processed at the end.
    
           -r <regex>
    
               Process the file in regex mode using _regex_ as described above.
    
               **NOTE:** The regex mode uses memory-mapped I/O and does not work
               on streams that do not support seeking, like terminals and
               pipes.
    
           -s <srcport>,<destport>,<tag>
    
               Include dummy SCTP headers before each packet. Specify, in
               decimal, the source and destination SCTP ports, and
               verification tag, for the packet. Use this option if your dump
               is the SCTP payload of a packet but does not include any SCTP,
               IP or Ethernet headers. Note that appropriate Ethernet and IP
               headers are automatically also included with each packet. A
               CRC32C checksum will be put into the SCTP header.
    
           -S <srcport>,<destport>,<ppi>
    
               Include dummy SCTP headers before each packet. Specify, in
               decimal, the source and destination SCTP ports, and a
               verification tag of 0, for the packet, and prepend a dummy
               SCTP DATA chunk header with a payload protocol identifier if
               _ppi_. Use this option if your dump is the SCTP payload of a
               packet but does not include any SCTP, IP or Ethernet headers.
               Note that appropriate Ethernet and IP headers are
               automatically included with each packet. A CRC32C checksum
               will be put into the SCTP header.
    
           -t <timefmt>
    
               Treats the text before the packet as a date/time code; _timefmt_
               is a format string supported by strftime(3), supplemented with
               the field descriptor '%f' for fractional seconds up to
               nanoseconds. Example: The time "10:15:14.5476" has the format
               code "%H:%M:%S.%f" The special format string _ISO_ indicates
               that the string should be parsed according to the ISO-8601
               specification. This parameter is used in regex mode if and
               only if the <time> capturing group is present.
    
               **NOTE:** Date/time fields from the current date/time are used as
               the default for unspecified fields.
    
           -T <srcport>,<destport>
    
               Include dummy TCP headers before each packet. Specify the
               source and destination TCP ports for the packet in decimal.
               Use this option if your dump is the TCP payload of a packet
               but does not include any TCP, IP or Ethernet headers. Note
               that appropriate Ethernet and IP headers are automatically
               also included with each packet. Sequence numbers will start at
               0.
    
           -u <srcport>,<destport>
    
               Include dummy UDP headers before each packet. Specify the
               source and destination UDP ports for the packet in decimal.
               Use this option if your dump is the UDP payload of a packet
               but does not include any UDP, IP or Ethernet headers. Note
               that appropriate Ethernet and IP headers are automatically
               also included with each packet. Example: _-u1000,69_ to make the
               packets look like TFTP/UDP packets.
    
           -v|--version
               Print the full version information and exit.
    
           -4 <srcip>,<destip>
    
               Prepend dummy IP header with specified IPv4 source and
               destination addresses. This option should be accompanied by
               one of the following options: -i, -s, -S, -T, -u Use this
               option to apply "custom" IP addresses. Example: _-4_
               _10.0.0.1,10.0.0.2_ to use 10.0.0.1 and 10.0.0.2 for all IP
               packets.
    
           -6 <srcip>,<destip>
    
               Prepend dummy IP header with specified IPv6 source and
               destination addresses. This option should be accompanied by
               one of the following options: -i, -s, -S, -T, -u Use this
               option to apply "custom" IP addresses. Example: _-6_
               _2001:db8::b3ff:fe1e:8329,2001:0db8:85a3::8a2e:0370:7334_ to use
               2001:db8::b3ff:fe1e:8329 and 2001:0db8:85a3::8a2e:0370:7334
               for all IP packets.
    
           --compress <type>
    
               Compress the output file using the type compression format.
               **--compress** with no argument provides a list of the compression
               formats supported for writing. The type given takes precedence
               over the extension of _outfile_.
    
           --little-endian
    
               Treat multiple byte groups as in little-endian byte order,
               instead of the default, network (big-endian) byte order.
    
               **NOTE:** This only applies to byte groups. If **-a** is used, the
               ASCII dump is still assumed to have the normal ordering.
    


## 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.
    


## NOTES



           This is the manual page for **Text2pcap** 4.5.0. **Text2pcap** is part of
           the **Wireshark** distribution. The latest version of **Wireshark** can be
           found at https://www.wireshark.org.
    


* * *