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Wireshark-dev: Re: [Wireshark-dev] Install of AAA dictionaries, DTDs and MIBS should be made op

From: Guy Harris <guy@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Thu, 27 Mar 2008 15:17:10 -0700

On Mar 27, 2008, at 2:35 AM, Luis EG Ontanon wrote:

My first thought was at a "delayed" initilalization (initialize just
them when needed, right when the dissector gets called for the first
time), but this has a major drawback not being there at initialization
the dynamic fields from these protocols could not be used in tshark
(or in wireshark up until when the first packet is dissected). i.e.
something like:
   tshark 'radius.UserName == "pippo"'
would not be possible.

Initialize them just when needed, when either

	1) the dissector gets called for the first time

or

2) a display filter reference occurs for a field name that would belong to the dissector, and that field name isn't found

which would require a way for a dissector to register a "wildcard" field name with a callback.

That then opens up the possibility doing that for *all* dissectors, which might further speed up startup.