Custom Information

The remaining configuration items allow you to enter information which IPTraf uses for its displays and logs.

Additional ports

Select this item to enter a port number to be included in the TCP/UDP counts in the TCP/UDP service statistics main menu item described above. By default, port numbers above 1023 are not monitored. If you do have a higher-numbered port to monitor, enter it here.

You will see two fields. If you have only one port to enter, just fill up the first field. To specify a range, fill both fields, the first port in the first field, the last port in the second field.

You can select this option multiple times to add more values or ranges.

Delete port/range

Select this item to remove a higher-numbered port number or port range you entered earlier with the Additional ports... option. A window will come up containing the entered ports and ranges. Select the entry you want delete and press Enter.

LAN Station Identifiers

The LAN station statistics facility monitors stations based on their respective MAC addresses. The hexadecimal notation of these addresses make them even more difficult to remember than the dotted-decimal IP addresses, so these facilities were added to help you better determine which station is which.

Selecting the Ethernet/PLIP host descriptions... or FDDI/Token Ring host descriptions... options brings up a submenu asking you to add, edit, or delete descriptions.

To add a new description, select the Add description... option. A dialog box will appear, asking you for the MAC address and an appropriate description. Type in the address in hexadecimal notation with no punctuation of any kind. The dialog box is case-insensitive for the address; the alphabetical digits A to F will be stored in lowercase.

Use the Tab key to move between fields and Enter to accept. Press Ctrl+X to discard this dialog and return to the main menu.

The description may be anything: the IP address, a fully-qualified domain name, or a description of your liking as long as the field can hold.

Enter as many descriptions as you need. Press Ctrl+X at a blank dialog after you have entered the last entry

These descriptions will be displayed alongside the MAC addresses in the LAN station monitor, together with the type of frame (Ethernet, PLIP, or FDDI).

An existing address or description may be edited by selecting the Edit description... option from the submenu. A panel will appear with a list of existing address descriptions. Select the one you wish to edit and press Enter. A dialog box identical to that when you add a description will appear with prefilled fields. Just backspace over and edit the fields. Press Enter to accept or Ctrl+X to cancel.

Selecting the Delete description... submenu item brings up the selection panel. Select the description you want to delete and press Enter. You can also press Ctrl+X to cancel the operation.

IPTraf 2.4 and later also recognizes the /etc/ethers file. Should a hardware address be present in the IPTraf definition files and in /etc/ethers, the IPTraf definition will be used.

NoteNote
 

The description file for Ethernet and PLIP is ethernet.desc, while the FDDI and Token Ring mappings are stored in fddi.desc in the IPTraf working directory. These files are in colon-delimited text format. Database engines or custom scripts can be told to append data lines to those files. Each line follows this simple format:

address:description

For example

00201e457e:Cisco 3640 gateway

Do not put colons, periods, or any invalid characters in the MAC address.