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HTML rendering created 2025-09-06 by Michael Kerrisk, author of The Linux Programming Interface. For details of in-depth Linux/UNIX system programming training courses that I teach, look here. Hosting by jambit GmbH. |
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NAME | SYNOPSIS | DESCRIPTION | OPTIONS | DIAGNOSTIC OPTIONS | EXAMPLES | SEE ALSO | NOTES | AUTHORS |
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CAPINFOS(1) CAPINFOS(1)
capinfos - Prints information about capture files
capinfos [ -a ] [ -A ] [ -b ] [ -B ] [ -c ] [ -C ] [ -d ] [ -D ] [
-e ] [ -E ] [ -F ] [ -h ] [ -H ] [ -i ] [ -I ] [ -k ] [ -K ] [ -l
] [ -L ] [ -m ] [ -M ] [ -n ] [ -N ] [ -o ] [ -p ] [ -P ] [ -q ] [
-Q ] [ -r ] [ -R ] [ -s ] [ -S ] [ -t ] [ -T ] [ -u ] [ -v ] [ -x
] [ -y ] [ -z ] <infile> ...
capinfos -h|--help
capinfos -v|--version
Capinfos is a program that reads one or more capture files and
returns some or all available statistics (infos) of each <infile>
in one of two types of output formats: long or table.
The long output is suitable for a human to read. The table output
is useful for generating a report that can be easily imported into
a spreadsheet or database.
The user specifies what type of output (long or table) and which
statistics to display by specifying flags (options) that
corresponding to the report type and desired infos. If no options
are specified, Capinfos will report all statistics available in
"long" format.
Options are processed from left to right order with later options
superseding or adding to earlier options.
Capinfos is able to detect and read the same capture files that
are supported by Wireshark. The input files don’t need a specific
filename extension; the file format and an optional gzip, zstd or
lz4 compression will be automatically detected. Near the beginning
of the DESCRIPTION section of wireshark(1) or
https://www.wireshark.org/docs/man-pages/wireshark.html is a
detailed description of the way Wireshark handles this, which is
the same way Capinfos handles this.
-a
Displays the timestamp of the earliest packet in the capture.
The earliest packet in the capture is not necessarily the
first packet in the capture - if packets exist "out-of-order",
time-wise, in the capture, Capinfos detects this.
-A
Generate all infos. By default Capinfos will display all infos
values for each input file, but enabling any of the individual
display infos options will disable the generate all option.
-b
Separate infos with ASCII SPACE (0x20) characters. This option
is only useful when generating a table style report (-T). The
various info values will be separated (delimited) from one
another with a single ASCII SPACE character.
Note
Since some of the header labels as well as some of the
value fields contain SPACE characters. This option is of
limited value unless one of the quoting options (-q or -Q)
is also specified.
-B
Separate the infos with ASCII TAB characters. This option is
only useful when generating a table style report (-T). The
various info values will be separated (delimited) from one
another with a single ASCII TAB character. The TAB character
is the default delimiter when -T style report is enabled.
-c
Displays the number of packets in the capture file.
-C
Cancel processing any additional files if and when Capinfos
fails to open an input file or gets an error reading an input
file. By default Capinfos will continue processing files even
if it gets an error opening or reading a file.
Note: An error message will be written to stderr whenever
Capinfos fails to open a file or gets an error reading from a
file regardless whether the -C option is specified or not.
Upon exit, Capinfos will return an error status if any errors
occurred during processing.
-d
Displays the total length of all packets in the file, in
bytes. This counts the size of the packets as they appeared in
their original form, not as they appear in this file. For
example, if a packet was originally 1514 bytes and only 256 of
those bytes were saved to the capture file (if packets were
captured with a snaplen or other slicing option), Capinfos
will consider the packet to have been 1514 bytes.
-D
Displays a count of the number of decryption secrets in the
file. This information is not available in table format.
-e
Displays the timestamp of the latest packet in the capture.
The latest packet in the capture is not necessarily the last
packet in the capture
• if packets exist "out-of-order", time-wise, in the
capture, Capinfos detects this.
-E
Displays the per-file encapsulation of the capture file.
-F
Displays additional capture file information.
-h|--help
Print the version number and options and exit.
-H
Displays the SHA256 and SHA1 hashes for the file. SHA1 output
may be removed in the future.
-i
Displays the average data rate, in bits/sec
-I
Displays detailed capture file interface information. This
information is not available in table format.
-k
Displays the capture comment. For pcapng files, this is the
comment from the section header block.
-K
Use this option to suppress printing capture comments. By
default capture comments are enabled. Capture comments are
relatively freeform and might contain embedded new-line
characters and/or other delimiting characters making it harder
for a human or machine to easily parse the Capinfos output.
Excluding capture comments can aid in post-processing of
output.
-l
Display the snaplen (if any) for a file. snaplen (if
available) is determined from the capture file header and by
looking for truncated records in the capture file.
-L
Generate long report. Capinfos can generate two different
styles of reports. The "long" report is the default style of
output and is suitable for a human to use.
-m
Separate the infos with comma (,) characters. This option is
only useful when generating a table style report (-T). The
various info values will be separated (delimited) from one
another with a single comma "," character.
-M
Print raw (machine readable) values in long reports. By
default Capinfos prints numeric values with human-readable SI
suffixes, and shows human-readable file type and
encapsulation. Table reports (-T) always print raw values.
-n
Displays a count of the number of resolved IPv4 addresses and
a count of the number of resolved IPv6 addresses in the file.
This information is not available in table format.
-N
Do not quote the infos. This option is only useful when
generating a table style report (-T). Excluding any quoting
characters around the various values and using a TAB delimiter
produces a very "clean" table report that is easily parsed
with CLI tools. By default infos are NOT quoted.
-o
Displays "True" if packets exist in strict chronological order
or "False" if one or more packets in the capture exists
"out-of-order" time-wise.
-p
Display individual packet comments. It is recommended to print
raw values (-M) when using this option as packet comments may
include newlines and other special characters.
-P
Disable displaying individual packet comments.
-q
Quote infos with single quotes ('). This option is only useful
when generating a table style report (-T). When this option is
enabled, each value will be encapsulated within a pair of
single quote (') characters. This option (when used with the
-m option) is useful for generating one type of CSV style file
report.
-Q
Quote infos with double quotes ("). This option is only useful
when generating a table style report (-T). When this option is
enabled, each value will be encapsulated within a pair of
double quote (") characters. This option (when used with the
-m option) is useful for generating the most common type of
CSV style file report.
-r
Do not generate header record. This option is only useful when
generating a table style report (-T). If this option is
specified then no header record will be generated within the
table report.
-R
Generate header record. This option is only useful when
generating a table style report (-T). A header is generated by
default. A header record (if generated) is the first line of
data reported and includes labels for all the columns included
within the table report.
-s
Displays the size of the file, in bytes. This reports the size
of the capture file itself.
-S
Display the earliest and latest packet timestamps as seconds
since January 1, 1970. Handy for synchronizing dumps using
editcap -t.
-t
Displays the capture type of the capture file.
-T
Generate a table report. A table report is a text file that is
suitable for importing into a spreadsheet or database.
Capinfos can build a tab delimited text file (the default) or
several variations on Comma-separated values (CSV) files.
-u
Displays the capture duration, in seconds. This is the
difference in time between the earliest packet seen and latest
packet seen.
-v|--version
Print the full version information and exit.
-x
Displays the average packet rate, in packets/sec
-y
Displays the average data rate, in bytes/sec
-z
Displays the average packet size, in bytes
--log-level <level>
Set the active log level. Supported levels in lowest to
highest order are "noisy", "debug", "info", "message",
"warning", "critical", and "error". Messages at each level and
higher will be printed, for example "warning" prints
"warning", "critical", and "error" messages and "noisy" prints
all messages. Levels are case insensitive.
--log-fatal <level>
Abort the program if any messages are logged at the specified
level or higher. For example, "warning" aborts on any
"warning", "critical", or "error" messages.
--log-domains <list>
Only print messages for the specified log domains, e.g.
"GUI,Epan,sshdump". List of domains must be comma-separated.
Can be negated with "!" as the first character (inverts the
match).
--log-debug <list>
Force the specified domains to log at the "debug" level. List
of domains must be comma-separated. Can be negated with "!" as
the first character (inverts the match).
--log-noisy <list>
Force the specified domains to log at the "noisy" level. List
of domains must be comma-separated. Can be negated with "!" as
the first character (inverts the match).
--log-fatal-domains <list>
Abort the program if any messages are logged for the specified
log domains. List of domains must be comma-separated.
--log-file <path>
Write log messages and stderr output to the specified file.
To see a description of the options use:
capinfos -h
To generate a long form report for the capture file mycapture.pcap
use:
capinfos mycapture.pcap
To generate a TAB delimited table form report for the capture file
mycapture.pcap use:
capinfos -T mycapture.pcap
To generate a CSV style table form report for the capture file
mycapture.pcap use:
capinfos -T -m -Q mycapture.pcap
or
capinfos -TmQ mycapture.pcap
To generate a TAB delimited table style report with just the
filenames, capture type, capture encapsulation type and packet
count for all the pcap files in the current directory use:
capinfos -T -t -E -c *.pcap
or
capinfos -TtEc *.pcap
Note: The ability to use of filename globbing characters are a
feature of *nix style command shells.
To generate a CSV delimited table style report of all infos for
all pcap files in the current directory and write it to a text
file called mycaptures.csv use:
capinfos -TmQ *.pcap >mycaptures.csv
The resulting mycaptures.csv file can be easily imported into
spreadsheet applications.
pcap(3), wireshark(1), mergecap(1), editcap(1), tshark(1),
dumpcap(1), captype(1), pcap-filter(7) or tcpdump(8)
This is the manual page for Capinfos 4.5.0. Capinfos is part of
the Wireshark distribution. The latest version of Wireshark can be
found at https://www.wireshark.org.
HTML versions of the Wireshark project man pages are available at
https://www.wireshark.org/docs/man-pages.
Original Author
Ian Schorr <ian[AT]ianschorr.com>
Contributors
Gerald Combs <gerald[AT]wireshark.org>
Jim Young <jyoung[AT]gsu.edu>.SH COLOPHON This page is part of the
wireshark (Interactively dump and analyze network traffic)
project. Information about the project can be found at
⟨https://www.wireshark.org/⟩. If you have a bug report for this
manual page, see
⟨https://gitlab.com/wireshark/wireshark/-/issues⟩. This page was
obtained from the project's upstream Git repository
⟨https://gitlab.com/wireshark/wireshark.git⟩ on 2025-08-11. (At
that time, the date of the most recent commit that was found in
the repository was 2025-08-11.) If you discover any rendering
problems in this HTML version of the page, or you believe there is
a better or more up-to-date source for the page, or you have
corrections or improvements to the information in this COLOPHON
(which is not part of the original manual page), send a mail to
[email protected]
2025-03-07 CAPINFOS(1)
Pages that refer to this page: captype(1), dumpcap(1), editcap(1)
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HTML rendering created 2025-09-06 by Michael Kerrisk, author of The Linux Programming Interface. For details of in-depth Linux/UNIX system programming training courses that I teach, look here. Hosting by jambit GmbH. |
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