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Wireshark-dev: [Wireshark-dev] Using find_conversation with multiple conversations conducted ov

Date: Fri, 26 Jun 2009 15:19:58 +1000

Hi Wireshark Dev List,

We have a network with DNP3.0 that is using UDP.  We have a gateway device that communicates to a collections of RTUs (RTU = Remote Terminal Unit, a device on the DNP3.0 network) over a serial radio-modem network and we talk to the gateway using UDP / IP.

The DNP3.0 dissector uses the standard calls to find_conversation etc... and fragment_add_seq_next etc... to do application layer frame re-assembly as follows:

      if (! (tr_fir && tr_fin))
      {
        /* A fragmented packet */
        pinfo->fragmented = TRUE;

        /* Look up the conversation to get the fragment reassembly id */
        conversation = find_conversation(pinfo->fd->num, &pinfo->src, &pinfo->dst,
          pinfo->ptype, pinfo->srcport, pinfo->destport, 0);

        if (conversation == NULL) {
          /* No conversation yet, so make one */
          conversation = conversation_new(pinfo->fd->num,  &pinfo->src, &pinfo->dst, pinfo->ptype,
            pinfo->srcport, pinfo->destport, 0);
        }

        conv_data_ptr = (dnp3_conv_t*)conversation_get_proto_data(conversation, proto_dnp3);

        if (conv_data_ptr == NULL) {
          /* New data structure required */
          conv_data_ptr = se_alloc(sizeof(dnp3_conv_t));

          /*** Increment static global fragment reassembly id ***/
          conv_data_ptr->conv_seq_number = seq_number++;

          conversation_add_proto_data(conversation, proto_dnp3, (void *)conv_data_ptr);
        }
        conv_seq_number = conv_data_ptr->conv_seq_number;

        /*
        * Add the frame to
        * whatever reassembly is in progress, if any, and see
        * if it's done.
        */

        frag_msg = fragment_add_seq_next(al_tvb, 0, pinfo, conv_seq_number,
            al_fragment_table,
            al_reassembled_table,
            tvb_reported_length(al_tvb), /* As this is a constructed tvb, all of it is ok */
            !tr_fin);

        next_tvb = process_reassembled_data(al_tvb, 0, pinfo,
            "Reassembled DNP 3.0 Application Layer message", frag_msg, &dnp3_frag_items,
            &update_col_info, tr_tree);

Unfortunately this does not take into account the fact that over the same IP address / port number pairs we may receive messages from many different source RTUs that should be treated as separate conversations.  The problem we have at the moment is that we are getting fragment re-assembly occurring for fragments from difference RTUs.

Is there a standard way to handle situations like this?  If so can someone point me to the correct dissector to look at?

We can provide packet captures that demonstrate the issue if desired.   It is considered acceptable to attach a .pcap file to a posting to this mailing list?

Thanks in advance,

Kelvin Proctor