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Wireshark 1.12.0 Release Notes


1. What is Wireshark?

Wireshark is the world’s most popular network protocol analyzer. It is used for troubleshooting, analysis, development and education.

2. What’s New

2.1. Bug Fixes

The following bugs have been fixed:

  • "On-the-wire" packet lengths are limited to 65535 bytes. (Bug 8808, Bug 9390)
  • "Follow TCP Stream" shows only the first HTTP request and response. (Bug 9044)
  • Files with pcap-ng Simple Packet Blocks can’t be read. (Bug 9200)
  • MPLS-over-PPP isn’t recognized. (Bug 9492)

2.2. New and Updated Features

The following features are new or have been significantly updated since version 1.10:

  • The Windows installer now uninstalls the previous version of Wireshark silently. You can still run the uninstaller manually beforehand if you wish to run it interactively.
  • Expert information is now filterable when the new API is in use.
  • The "Number" column shows related packets and protocol conversation spans (Qt only).
  • When manipulating packets with editcap using the -C <choplen> and/or -s <snaplen> options, it is now possible to also adjust the original frame length using the -L option.
  • You can now pass the -C <choplen> option to editcap multiple times, which allows you to chop bytes from the beginning of a packet as well as at the end of a packet in a single step.
  • You can now specify an optional offset to the -C option for editcap, which allows you to start chopping from that offset instead of from the absolute packet beginning or end.
  • "malformed" display filter has been renamed to "_ws.malformed". A handful of other filters have been given the "_ws." prefix to note they are Wireshark application specific filters and not dissector filters.
  • The Kerberos dissector has been replaced with an auto generated one from ASN1 protocol description, changing a lot of filter names.

Additionally the Windows installers have an extra component: a preview of the upcoming user interface for Wireshark 2.0.

The following features are new (or have been significantly updated) since version 1.11.3:

  • Transport name resolution is now disabled by default.
  • Support has been added for all versions of the DCBx protocol.
  • Cleanup of LLDP code, all dissected fields are now navigable.

The following features are new (or have been significantly updated) since version 1.11.2:

  • Qt port:

    • The About dialog has been added
    • The Capture Interfaces dialog has been added.
    • The Decode As dialog has been added. It managed to swallow up the User Specified Decodes dialog as well.
    • The Export PDU dialog has been added.
    • Several SCTP dialogs have been added.
    • The statistics tree (the backend for many Statistics and Telephony menu items) dialog has been added.
    • The I/O Graph dialog has been added.
    • French translation has updated.

The following features are new (or have been significantly updated) since version 1.11.1:

  • Mac OS X packaging has been improved.

The following features are new (or have been significantly updated) since version 1.11.0:

  • Dissector output may be encoded as UTF-8. This includes TShark output.
  • Qt port:

    • The Follow Stream dialog now supports packet and TCP stream selection.
    • A Flow Graph (sequence diagram) dialog has been added.
    • The main window now respects geometry preferences.

2.3. Removed Dissectors

  • The ASN1 plugin has been removed as it’s deemed obsolete.
  • The GNM dissector has been removed as it was never used.
  • The Kerberos hand made dissector has been replaced by one generated from ASN1 code.

2.4. Platform Support

Support for Windows XP has been deprecated. We will make an effort to support it for as long as possible but our ability to do so depends on upstream packages and other factors beyond our control.

U3 packages are no longer supported or provided.

This is the last major release that will support 32-bit versions of Mac OS X.

2.5. New Protocol Support

29West, 802.1AE Secure tag, A21, ACR122, ADB Client-Server, AllJoyn, Apple PKTAP, Aruba Instant AP, ASTERIX, ATN, Bencode, Bluetooth 3DS, Bluetooth HSP, Bluetooth Linux Monitor Transport, Bluetooth Low Energy, Bluetooth Low Energy RF Info, CARP, CFDP, Cisco MetaData, DCE/RPC MDSSVC, DeviceNet, ELF file format, Ethernet Local Management Interface (E-LMI), Ethernet Passive Optical Network (EPON), EXPORTED PDU, FINGER, HDMI, High-Speed LAN Instrument Protocol (HiSLIP), HTTP2, IDRP, IEEE 1722a, ILP, iWARP Direct Data Placement and Remote Direct Memory Access Protocol, Kafka, Kyoto Tycoon, Landis & Gyr Telegyr 8979, LBM, LBMC, LBMPDM, LBMPDM-TCP, LBMR, LBT-RM, LBT-RU, LBT-TCP, Lightweight Mesh (v1.1.1), Link16, Linux netlink, Linux netlink netfilter, Linux netlink sock diag, Linux rtnetlink (route netlink), Logcat, MBIM, Media Agnostic USB (MA USB), MiNT, MP4 / ISOBMFF file format, MQ Telemetry Transport Protocol, MS NLB (Rewrite), Novell PKIS certificate extensions, NXP PN532 HCI, Open Sound Control, OpenFlow, Pathport, PDC, Picture Transfer Protocol Over IP, PKTAP, Private Data Channel, QUIC (Quick UDP Internet Connections), SAE J1939, SEL RTAC (Real Time Automation Controller) EIA-232 Serial-Line Dissection, Sippy RTPproxy, SMB-Direct, SPDY, STANAG 4607, STANAG 5066 DTS, STANAG 5066 SIS, Tinkerforge, Ubertooth, UDT, URL Encoded Form Data, USB Communications and CDC Control, USB Device Firmware Upgrade, VP8, WHOIS, Wi-Fi Display, and ZigBee Green Power profile

2.6. Updated Protocol Support

Too many protocols have been updated to list here.

2.7. New and Updated Capture File Support

Netscaler 2.6, STANAG 4607, and STANAG 5066 Data Transfer Sublayer

2.8. Major API Changes

The libwireshark API has undergone some major changes:

  • A more flexible, modular memory manager (wmem) has been added. It was available experimentally in 1.10 but is now mature and has mostly replaced the old emem API (which is deprecated).
  • A new API for expert information has been added, replacing the old one.
  • The tvbuff API has been cleaned up: tvb_length has been renamed to tvb_captured_length for clarity, and tvb_get_string and tvb_get_stringz have been deprecated in favour of tvb_get_string_enc and tvb_get_stringz_enc.
  • dissector_try_heuristic() signature has been changed to return heur_dtbl_entry_t to make it possible to save it and use it in subsequent calls to avoid the overhead of going trough the heuristics list.

3. Getting Wireshark

Wireshark source code and installation packages are available from http://www.wireshark.org/download.html.

3.1. Vendor-supplied Packages

Most Linux and Unix vendors supply their own Wireshark packages. You can usually install or upgrade Wireshark using the package management system specific to that platform. A list of third-party packages can be found on the download page on the Wireshark web site.

4. File Locations

Wireshark and TShark look in several different locations for preference files, plugins, SNMP MIBS, and RADIUS dictionaries. These locations vary from platform to platform. You can use About→Folders to find the default locations on your system.

5. Known Problems

Dumpcap might not quit if Wireshark or TShark crashes. (Bug 1419)

The BER dissector might infinitely loop. (Bug 1516)

Capture filters aren’t applied when capturing from named pipes. (ws-buglink:1814)

Filtering tshark captures with read filters (-R) no longer works. (Bug 2234)

The 64-bit Windows installer does not support Kerberos decryption. (Win64 development page)

Resolving (Bug 9044) reopens (Bug 3528) so that Wireshark no longer automatically decodes gzip data when following a TCP stream.

Application crash when changing real-time option. (Bug 4035)

Hex pane display issue after startup. (Bug 4056)

Packet list rows are oversized. (Bug 4357)

Summary pane selected frame highlighting not maintained. (Bug 4445)

Wireshark and TShark will display incorrect delta times in some cases. (Bug 4985)

The 64-bit Mac OS X installer doesn’t support Mac OS X 10.9 (Bug 9242)

6. Getting Help

Community support is available on Wireshark’s Q&A site and on the wireshark-users mailing list. Subscription information and archives for all of Wireshark’s mailing lists can be found on the web site.

Official Wireshark training and certification are available from Wireshark University.

7. Frequently Asked Questions

A complete FAQ is available on the Wireshark web site.