Wireshark · Ethereal-dev: Re: [Ethereal-dev] Re: Ethereal Gripe

[Laurent Deniel <laurent.deniel@xxxxxxx>]

Jason House wrote:
> I think that a language for building packets should be done before a 
> graphical editor.  I would hope that the language(s) for specifying 
> packets (or their attributes) would be more powerful than any graphical 
> interface...

I agree. And once a powerful language (and associated conversion routines)
are defined, building a graphical interface is the logical next step.

Note that decoding of packets without any hardcoded C code within ethereal
was already discussed a long time ago (and this result in part in the creation
of the plugin API). Refer to the thread (there are some interesting historical
remarks) :

http://ethereal.netarc.jp/lists/ethereal-dev/199812/msg00035.html
http://ethereal.netarc.jp/lists/ethereal-dev/199812/msg00031.html

Laurent