Wireshark · Wireshark-bugs: [Wireshark-bugs] [Bug 6645] Patch to add support for Friendly Names for interfaces on Windows

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https://bugs.wireshark.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=6645

--- Comment #16 from Mike Garratt <wireshark@xxxxxxxxx> 2012-09-26 04:20:12 PDT ---
>> 1. Extend the if_info_t type to include char * interface_alias; in
>> addition to name and description.
>
> I'd call that "friendly_name", reflecting what it's intended to be rather than
> what some Windows APIs call it.
> 
Sounds good, happy to go with friendly_name in if_info_t.

>> 2. Extend dumpcap so it returns both the interface alias and vendor  
>> description when programmatically queried by the wireshark gui for 
>> the interface list.
>
> Yes.  On Windows, return both, if available; on UN*X, return the description,
> as returned by libpcap, as the friendly name (in those cases where it's
> returned on UN*X, it'll be a friendly name, rather than a vendor description).
>

>From the looks of things on my linux vm, the description sits half way between
a vendor description and a friendly name.
e.g.
  $ dumpcap -D
  1. eth0
  2. usbmon1 (USB bus number 1)
  3. usbmon2 (USB bus number 2)
  4. any (Pseudo-device that captures on all interfaces)
  5. lo

The actual name on linux is already very friendly.

I plan on adding code that allows you to specify the interface in dumpcap by
friendly name when known (possibly even with prefix matching if exact match
fails), but wasn't thinking to support interface matching by vendor
description.

I can't really see people specifying an interface by the linux descriptions
shown above, which puts more weight on a view that libpcap/winpcap description
consistently = vendor description.  I am however unaware of the behaviour on
other UN*X platforms/other linux network configurations.  It is a minor point
though and we can always refine the implementation later.

I will start on the code over the next few days, I expect it to be a few weeks
before I submit anything though as I have limited time for recreational
development right now.

Thanks,

- Mike

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