Question

I am trying to write a .pcap file, which is something that can be used in Wireshark.
In order to do that, I have a couple of structs with various data types I need to write to a file. (see code)

So, I create the struct instances, fill in the data, use FILE* fp = fopen(“test.pcap”,”w”), and then I’m unsure how to properly write it to the file. I believe I should use memcpy but I’m not sure of the best way to do it. I have mostly resorted to C++ libraries in the past to do this. Any suggestions?

typedef struct pcap_hdr_s {
        uint32_t magic_number;   /* magic number */
        uint16_t version_major;  /* major version number */
        uint16_t version_minor;  /* minor version number */
        int32_t  thiszone;       /* GMT to local correction */
        uint32_t sigfigs;        /* accuracy of timestamps */
        uint32_t snaplen;        /* max length of captured packets, in octets */
        uint32_t network;        /* data link type */
} pcap_hdr_t;

typedef struct pcaprec_hdr_s {
   uint32_t ts_sec;         /* timestamp seconds */
   uint32_t ts_usec;        /* timestamp microseconds */
   uint32_t incl_len;       /* number of octets of packet saved in file */
   uint32_t orig_len;       /* actual length of packet */
} pcaprec_hdr_t;

typedef struct ethernet_hdr_s {
   uint8_t dst[6];    /* destination host address */
   uint8_t src[6];    /* source host address */
   uint16_t type;     /* IP? ARP? RARP? etc */
} ethernet_hdr_t;

typedef struct ip_hdr_s {
   uint8_t  ip_hl:4, /* both fields are 4 bits */
            ip_v:4;
   uint8_t        ip_tos;
   uint16_t       ip_len;
   uint16_t       ip_id;
   uint16_t       ip_off;
   uint8_t        ip_ttl;
   uint8_t        ip_p;
   uint16_t       ip_sum;
   uint32_t ip_src;
   uint32_t ip_dst;
}ip_hdr_t;

typedef struct udp_header
{
  uint16_t src;
  uint16_t dst;
  uint16_t length;
  uint16_t checksum;
} udp_header_t;

Answer 1

Use fwrite(). You need to check this info but I think .pcap files are written in binary mode.

Example:

pcaprec_hdr_t pcaprec_hdr;
// fill pcaprec_hdr with valid info

FILE* pFile = NULL;
pFile = fopen ("myfile.pcap" , "wb"); // open for writing in binary mode

fwrite (&pcaprec_hdr, 1, sizeof(pcaprec_hdr_t) , pFile);

fclose(pFile);