What is Pcapy?

Pcapy is a Python extension module that interfaces with the libpcap packet capture library. Pcapy enables python scripts to capture packets on the network. Pcapy is highly effective when used in conjunction with a packet-handling package such as Impacket, which is a collection of Python classes for constructing and dissecting network packets.

Source code

Latest stable release (0.10.6), updated December 4, 2008 - gzip'd tarball, zip file
0.10.5, updated on March 27, 2007 - gzip'd tarball, zip file
0.10.3, updated on Jan 5, 2004 - gzip'd tarball, zip file
0.10.2, updated on Oct 27, 2003 - gzip'd tarball, zip file

Win32 binaries: Pick the appropriate Python or WinPcap version.

Latest release (0.10.6), updated on December 4, 2008 - windows installer - Python 2.5 and WinPcap 4.0.
0.10.5, updated on March 27, 2007 - windows installer - Python 2.5 and WinPcap 4.0.
0.10.4, updated on Sep 14, 2005 - windows installer - Python 2.4 and WinPcap 3.1.

Advantages of Pcapy

Works with Python threads.
Functions in both UNIX with libpcap and Windows with WinPcap.
Provides a simpler Object Oriented API.

Setup

Quick start

Click the following link to get the latest stable release. Once you have done that, unpack it and run the

python setup.py install

from the directory where you placed it.

Requirements

A Python interpreter. Versions 2.1.3 and higher.
A C++ compiler. GCC G++ 2.95, as well as Microsoft Visual Studio 6.0 or MSVC 2003 depending on the Python version.
A Libpcap 0.9.3 or newer. Windows users should have installed WinPcap 4.0 or newer.

Compiling the source and installing

As this extension is written in C++ it needs to be compiled for the host system before it can be accessed from Python. In order to compile and install the source, execute

python setup.py install

from the directory where Pcapy's distribution has been unpacked. This will install the extension into the default Python modules path (you might need special permissions to write there). For more information on what commands and options are available from setup.py, run:

python setup.py --help-commands

This extension has been tested on Linux and Windows 2000 and XP systems and is known to work there. However, it should work on any box where Python and libpcap are available.

Documentation

Click here for a copy of the bundled documentation.

Readme

Version 0.10.6 fixes a bug in the next() function reported by Arnaud Fontaine (see
http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=500043).

Known issues

Some functions that are part of the pcap API have not been wrapped.

Licensing

This software is provided under a slightly modified version of the Apache Software License. Feel free to review it here and compare it to the official Apache Software License.