5 Writing a "plugin" dissector is not very different from writing a
6 standard one. In fact all of the functions described in
7 README.developer can be used in the plugins exactly as they are used in
10 (Note, however, that not all OSes on which Wireshark runs can support
13 If you've chosen "xxx" as the name of your plugin (typically, that would
14 be a short name for your protocol, in all lower case), the following
15 instructions tell you how to implement it as a plugin. All occurrences
16 of "xxx" below should be replaced by the name of your plugin.
18 2. The directory for the plugin, and its files
20 The plugin should be placed in a new plugins/xxx directory which should
21 contain minimally the following files:
33 The source files and header files for your dissector
35 Examples of these files can be found in plugins/gryphon.
37 2.1 AUTHORS, COPYING, and ChangeLog
39 The AUTHORS, COPYING, and ChangeLog are the standard sort of GPL project
44 For your plugins/xxx/CMakeLists.txt file, see the corresponding file in
45 plugins/gryphon. Replace all occurrences of "gryphon" in those files
46 with "xxx" and add your source files to the DISSECTOR_SRC variable.
50 For your plugins/xxx/Makefile.am file, see the corresponding file in
51 plugins/gryphon. Replace all occurrences of "gryphon" in those files
56 Your plugins/xxx/Makefile.common should only list the main source file(s),
57 which exports register_*() and handoff_*(), for your dissector in the
58 DISSECTOR_SRC variable. All other supporting source files should be listed
59 in the DISSECTOR_SUPPORT_SRC variable, and this variable added to the
60 xxx_la_SOURCES variable in Makefile.am.
61 The header files for your dissector, if any, must be listed in the
62 DISSECTOR_INCLUDES variable. The DISSECTOR_INCLUDES variable should not
67 For your plugins/xxx/Makefile.nmake file, see the corresponding file in
68 plugins/gryphon. No modifications are needed here.
72 Your plugins/xxx/moduleinfo.h file is used to set the version information
77 Your plugins/xxx/moduleinfo.nmake is used to set the version information
78 for building the plugin. Its contents should match that in moduleinfo.h
82 Your plugins/xxx/plugin.rc.in is the Windows resource template file
83 used to add the plugin specific information as resources to the DLL.
84 No modifications are needed here.
86 3. Changes to existing Wireshark files
88 You will also need to change the following files:
93 packaging/nsis/Makefile.nmake
94 packaging/nsis/wireshark.nsi
96 plugins/Makefile.nmake
98 You might also want to search your Wireshark development directory for
99 occurrences of an existing plugin name, in case this document is out of
100 date with the current directory structure. For example,
104 could be used from a shell prompt.
106 3.1 Changes to plugins/Makefile.am
108 The plugins directory contains a Makefile.am. You need to change the
109 SUBDIRS directive to reflect the addition of your plugin:
111 SUBDIRS = $(_CUSTOM_SUBDIRS_) \
117 3.2 Changes to plugins/Makefile.nmake
119 In plugins/Makefile.nmake you need to add to the PLUGINS_LIST
120 (in alphabetical order) the name of your dissector (actually:
121 the name of the plugins sub-directory which contains your dissector).
123 3.3 Changes to the top level Makefile.am
125 Add your plugin (in alphabetical order) to the plugin_ldadd:
131 -dlopen plugins/gryphon/gryphon.la \
132 -dlopen plugins/irda/irda.la \
133 -dlopen plugins/xxx/xxx.la \
136 3.4 Changes to the top level configure.in
138 You need to add your plugins Makefile (in alphbetical order) to the AC_OUTPUT
139 rule in the configure.in
143 plugins/gryphon/Makefile
144 plugins/irda/Makefile
149 3.5 Changes to epan/Makefile.am
151 Add the relative path of your plugin (in alphbetical order) to plugin_src:
155 ../plugins/gryphon/packet-gryphon.c \
156 ../plugins/irda/packet-irda.c \
157 ../plugins/xxx/packet-xxx.c \
160 3.6 Changes to CMakeLists.txt
162 Add your plugin (in alphabetical order) to the PLUGIN_SRC_DIRS:
173 3.7 Changes to the installers
175 If you want to include your plugin in an installer you have to add lines
176 in the NSIS installer Makefile.nmake and wireshark.nsi files.
178 For the NSIS installer:
180 Add ../../plugins/xxx/xxx.dll to the list of plugins for the
181 PLUGINS variable in packaging/nsis/Makefile.nmake.
185 File "..\..\plugins\xxx\xxx.dll"
187 to the list of "File" statements in the "Dissector Plugins"
188 section in packaging/nsis/wireshark.nsi.
190 The U3 and PortableApps installers build their manifests, including plugins,
191 from packaging/nsis/wireshark.nsi via the packaging/ws-manifest.pl script.
193 4. Development and plugins on Unix
195 Plugins make some aspects of development easier and some harder.
197 The first thing is that you'll have to run autogen.sh and configure
198 once more to setup your build environment.
200 The good news is that if you are working on a single plugin
201 then you will find recompiling the plugin MUCH faster than
202 recompiling a dissector and then linking it back into Wireshark.
204 The bad news is that Wireshark will not use the plugins unless the
205 plugins are installed in one of the places it expects them to find.
207 One way of dealing with this problem is to set an environment variable
208 when running Wireshark: WIRESHARK_RUN_FROM_BUILD_DIRECTORY=1.
210 Another way to deal with this problem is to set up a working root for
211 wireshark, say in $HOME/build/root and build wireshark to install
214 ./configure --prefix=${HOME}/build/root;make install
216 then subsequent rebuilds/installs of your plugin can be accomplished
217 by going to the plugins/xxx directory and running
221 5. Update "old style" plugins
223 5.1 How to update an "old style" plugin (using plugin_register and
224 plugin_reg_handoff functions).
226 The plugin registration has changed with the extension of the build
227 scripts. These now generate the additional code needed for plugin
228 encapsulation in plugin.c. When using the new style build scripts,
229 stips the parts outlined below:
231 o Remove the following include statements:
234 #include "moduleinfo.h"
236 o Removed the definition:
238 #ifndef ENABLE_STATIC
239 G_MODULE_EXPORT gchar version[] = VERSION;
242 o Move relevant code from the blocks and delete these functions:
244 #ifndef ENABLE_STATIC
249 #ifndef ENABLE_STATIC
254 This will leave a clean dissector source file without plugin specifics.
256 5.2 How to update an "old style" plugin (using plugin_init function)
258 The plugin registering has changed between 0.10.9 and 0.10.10; everyone
259 is encouraged to update their plugins as outlined below:
261 o Remove following include statements from all plugin sources:
263 #include "plugins/plugin_api.h"
264 #include "plugins/plugin_api_defs.h"
266 o Remove the init function.
268 o Add a new Makefile.common file with the lists of source files and
271 o Change the Makefile.am and Makefile.nmake files to match those of
276 Ed Warnicke <hagbard@physics.rutgers.edu>
277 Guy Harris <guy@alum.mit.edu>
279 Derived and expanded from the plugin section of README.developers
280 which was originally written by
282 James Coe <jammer@cin.net>
283 Gilbert Ramirez <gram@alumni.rice.edu>
284 Jeff Foster <jfoste@woodward.com>
285 Olivier Abad <oabad@cybercable.fr>
286 Laurent Deniel <laurent.deniel@free.fr>
287 Jaap Keuter <jaap.keuter@xs4all.nl>