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= Wireshark {wireshark-version} Release Notes
// Asciidoctor Syntax Quick Reference:
// https://asciidoctor.org/docs/asciidoc-syntax-quick-reference/

This is an experimental release intended to test new features for Wireshark 4.4.

== What is Wireshark?

Wireshark is the world’s most popular network protocol analyzer.
It is used for troubleshooting, analysis, development and education.

== What’s New

// Add a summary of **major** changes here.
// Add other changes to "New and Updated Features" below.

Many improvements and fixes to the graphing dialogs, including
I/O Graphs, Flow Graph / VoIP Calls, and TCP Stream Graphs.

Wireshark now supports automatic profile switching.
You can associate a display filter with a configuration profile, and when you open a capture file that matches the filter, Wireshark will automatically switch to that profile.

Support for Lua 5.3 and 5.4 has been added, and support for Lua 5.1 and 5.2 has been removed.
The Windows and macOS installers now ship with Lua 5.4.6.

Improved display filter support for value strings (optional string representations for numeric fields).

Display filter functions can be implemented as plugins, similar to protocol dissectors and file parsers.

Display filters can be translated to pcap filters using menu:Edit[Copy,Display filter as pcap filter] if each display filter field has a corresponding pcap filter equivalent.

Custom columns can be defined using any valid field expression, such as
display filter functions, packet slices, arithmetic calculations, logical tests,
raw byte addressing, and protocol layer modifiers.

Custom output fields for `tshark -e` can also be defined using any
valid field expression.

Wireshark can be built with the zlib-ng instead of zlib for compressed file support.
Zlib-ng is substantially faster than zlib.
The official Windows and macOS packages include this feature.

Many other improvements have been made.
See the “New and Updated Features” section below for more details.

//=== Bug Fixes

//The following bugs have been fixed:
//* wsbuglink:5000[]
//* wsbuglink:6000[Wireshark bug]
//* cveidlink:2014-2486[]
//* Wireshark grabs your ID at 3 am, goes to Waffle House, and insults people.

=== New and Updated Features

The following features are either new or have been significantly updated since version 4.2.0:

* The Windows installers now ship with Npcap 1.79.
  They previously shipped with Npcap 1.78.

//* The Windows installers now ship with Qt 6.5.2.
//  They previously shipped with Qt 6.2.3.

* Improvements to the "I/O Graphs" dialog:

  ** A number of crasher bugs have been fixed.

  ** The protocol tree context menu can open a I/O graph of the currently
     selected field. wsbuglink:11362[]

  ** Smaller intervals can be used, down to 1 microsecond. wsbuglink:13682[]

  ** A larger number of I/O Graph item buckets can be used, up to 2^25^ (33 million)
     items. wsbuglink:8460[]

  ** The size of individual graph items has been reduced, which reduces memory utilization.

  ** When the Y field or Y axis changes, the graph displays the new graph
     correctly, retapping if necessary, instead of displaying information
     based on stale data.

  ** The graph is smarter about choosing whether to retap (expensive),
     recalculate (moderately intensive), or replot (cheap) in order to
     display the newly chosen options correctly with the least amount of
     calculations. For instance, a graph that has previously been
     plotted and is disabled and then reenabled without any other changes
     will not require a new retap. wsbuglink:15822[]

  ** LOAD graphs are graphed properly again. wsbuglink:18450[]

  ** Y axes have human readable units with SI prefixes.
     wsbuglink:12827[]

  ** Bar widths are scaled to the size of the interval.

  ** Bar border colors are a slightly darker color than that
     of the graph itself, instead of always black. wsbuglink:17422[]

  ** Time values have the correct width when axes are automatically reset.

  ** The precision of the interval time shown in the hint message depends
     on the interval.

  ** The tracer follows the currently selected row on the table of graphs,
     and does not appear on an invisible graph.

  ** The tracer moves to the frame selected in the main window.
     wsbuglink:12909[]

  ** Pending graph changes are saved when changing profiles when the
     I/O Graphs dialog is open.

  ** I/O Graph dialog windows for closed capture files are no longer affected
     by changing the list of graphs (either in that dialogs or in other dialogs
     for the currently open file.)

  ** Newly created temporary graphs, which will not be saved
     unless the configuration has changed, are more clearly marked with
     italics.

  ** When "Time of Day" is selected for a graph, the absolute time will be
     saved to CSV exports instead of the relative time. wsbuglink:13717[]

  ** Graphs can be reordered by dragging and dropping their list entries. wsbuglink:13855[]

  ** The graph layer order and legend order always matches the
     order in the graph list. Legends also appear properly. wsbuglink:13854[]

  ** The legend can be moved to other corners of the graph by right-clicking
     on it and selecting its new location from a menu.

  ** For purposes of displaying zero values, graphs with both lines and data point symbols are treated as line graphs, not scatter plots.

  ** Logarithmic ticks are used when the Y axis is logarithmic.

  ** The graph crosshairs context menu option works.

  ** You can resize the graph list columns to their contents by right clicking on the list header.
     wsbuglink:18102[]

  ** The graph is more responsive to mouse movement, especially on Linux Wayland.

* Improvements to the Sequence Diagram (Flow Graphs and VoIP Calls):

  ** When exporting the graph as an image, the entire graph is shown
     with up to 1000 items instead of only what was visible on-screen.
     This value can be increased in the preferences. wsbuglink:13504[]

  ** Endpoints that share the same address now have two distinct nodes
     with a line between them. wsbuglink:12038[]

  ** The "Comment" column can be resized by selecting the axis between the
     "Comment" column and the graph and dragging, and auto-resized by
     double-clicking the column. wsbuglink:4972[]

  ** Tooltips are shown for elided comments.

  ** The scroll direction via keyboard is no longer reversed. wsbuglink:12932[]

  ** The column widths are fixed instead of resizing slightly depending
     on the visible entries. wsbuglink:12931[]

  ** The Y axis labels stay in the correct position without having to
     click the btn:[Reset] button.

  ** The progress bar appears correctly in the Flow Graph (non VoIP Calls).

  ** The behavior of the "Any" and "Network" combobox is corrected.
     wsbuglink:19818[]

  ** "Limit to Display Filter" is checked if a display filter is applied
     when the Flow Graph is opened, per the documentation.


* TCP Stream Graphs:

  ** A better decision is made about which side is the server and thus
     the initially chosen direction in the graph.

  ** The "Window Scaling" graph axis labels are corrected and show both graphs.

  ** The graph crosshairs context menu option works.

  ** Switching between relative and absolute sequence numbers works again.

* The "Follow Stream" dialog can now show delta times between turns and all packets and events.

* A number of graphs using the QCustomPlot widget ("I/O Graphs", "Flow Graph",
  "TCP Stream Graphs", and "RTP Player") are more responsive to mouse
  movement, especially on Linux when Wayland is used.

* The "Find Packet" dialog can search backwards and find additional occurrences
  of a string, hex value, or regular expression in a single frame.

* When using "Go To Packet" with an undisplayed frame, the window goes to
  nearest displayed frame by number. wsbuglink:2988[]

* Display filter syntax enhancements:

  ** Better handling of comparisons with value strings. Now the display filter engine can
     correctly handle cases where multiple different numeric values map to the same value
     string, including but not limited to range-type value strings.

  ** Fields with value strings now support regular expression matching.

  ** Date and time values now support arithmetic, with some restrictions:
     the multiplier/divisor must be an integer or floating point number and appear on the right-hand
     side of the operator.

  ** The keyword "bitand" can be used as an alternative syntax for the bitwise-and operator.

  ** Functions alone can now be used as an entire logical expression.
     The result of the expression is the truthiness of the function return
     value (or of all values if more than one). This is useful for example to write
     "len(something)" instead of "len(something) != 0". Even more so if a function
     returns itself a boolean value, it is now possible to write
     "bool_test(some.field)" instead of having to write "bool_test(some.field) == True".
     Both forms are now valid.

  ** Display filter references can be written without curly braces. It
     is now possible to write `$frame.number` instead of `${frame.number}` for example.

  ** There are new display filter functions which test various IP address properties.
     Check the
     https://www.wireshark.org/docs/man-pages/wireshark-filter.html[wireshark-filter](5)
     man page for more information.

  ** There are new display filter functions which convert unsigned integer types to
     decimal or hexadecimal, and convert fields with value strings into the
     associated string for their value, which can be used to produce results similar to
     custom columns. Check the
     https://www.wireshark.org/docs/man-pages/wireshark-filter.html[wireshark-filter](5)
     man page for more information.

  ** Display filter macros can be written with a semicolon after the macro
     name before the argument list, e.g. `${mymacro;arg1;...;argN}`, instead
     of `${mymacro:arg1;...;argN}`. The version with semicolons works better
     with pop-up suggestions when editing the display filter, so the version
     with the colon might be removed in the future.

  ** Display filter macros can be written using a function-like notation.
     The macro `${mymacro:arg1;...;argN}` can be written
     `$mymacro(arg1,...,argN)`.

  ** AX.25 addresses are now filtered using the "CALLSIGN-SSID" string syntax.
     Filtering based on the raw bytes values is still possible, like other
     field types, with the `@` operator.  wsbuglink:17973[]

* Display filter functions can be implemented as libwireshark plugins. Plugins are loaded
  during startup from the usual binary plugin configuration directories. See the
  `ipaddr.c` source file in the distribution for an example of a display filter C plugin
  and the doc/plugins.example folder for generic instructions how to build a plugin.

* Display filter autocompletions now also include display filter functions.

* The display filter macro configuration file has changed format. It now uses
  the same format as the "dfilters" file and has been renamed accordingly to
  "dmacros". Internally it no longer uses the UAT API and the display filter macro
  GUI dialog has been updated. There is some basic migration logic implemented
  but it is advisable to check that the "dfilter_macros" (old) and
  "dmacros" (new) files in the profile directory are consistent.

* Custom columns can be defined using any valid field expression:

  ** Display filter functions, like `len(tcp.payload)`, including nested functions
     like `min(len(tcp.payload), len(udp.payload))` and newly defined functions
     using the plugin system mentioned above. wsbuglink:15990[] wsbuglink:16181[]

  ** Arithmetic calculations, like `ip.len * 8` or `tcp.srcport + tcp.dstport`.
     wsbuglink:7752[]

  ** Slices, like `tcp.payload[4:4]`. wsbuglink:10154[]

  ** The layer operator, like `ip.proto#1`, which will return the protocol field in the
     first IPv4 layer if there is tunneling. wsbuglink:18588[]

  ** Raw byte addressing, like `@ip`, which will return the bytes of protocol
     or FT_NONE fields, among others. wsbuglink:19076[]

  ** Logical tests, like `tcp.port == 443`, which produce a check mark if
     the test matches (similar to protocol and FT_NONE fields without `@`.)
     This works with all logical operators, including e.g. regular expression
     matching (`matches` or `~`.)

  ** Defined display filter macros.

  ** Any combination of the above also works.

  ** Multifield columns are still available. For backwards compatibility,
     `X or Y` is interpreted as a multifield column as before. To represent a
     logical test for the presence of multiple fields instead of concatenating
     values, use parenthesis, e.g. `(tcp.options.timestamp or tcp.options.nop)`.

  ** Field references are not implemented because there's no sense of a
     currently selected frame. "Resolved" column values (such as host name
     resolution or value string lookup) are not supported for any of the new
     expressions yet.

* Custom output fields for `tshark -e <field>` can also be defined using any
  valid field expression as above.

  ** For custom output fields, `X or Y` is the usual logical test; to output
     multiple fields use multiple `-e` terms as before.

  ** The various `-E` options, including `-E occurrence`, all work as expected.

* When selecting "Manage Interfaces" from "Capture Options", Wireshark only
  attempts to reconnect to rpcap hosts that were active in the
  last session, instead of every remote host that the current profile has ever
  connected to. wsbuglink:17484[]

* The "Resolved Addresses" dialog only shows what addresses and ports are
  present in the file (not including information from static files), and
  selected rows or the entire table can be saved or copied to the clipboard
  in several formats. wsbuglink:16419[]

* Dumpcap and Wireshark support the `-F` option when capturing a file
  on the command line. wsbuglink:18009[]

* When capturing on the command line dumpcap accepts a `-Q` option that is
  quieter than `-q` and prints only errors to standard error, similar to tshark.
  wsbuglink:14491[]

* When capturing a file and requesting the `pcap` format, nanosecond resolution
  time stamps will be written if the device and version of libpcap supports it.

* When capturing using a file size autostop or ring buffer condition,
  the maximum value is now 2 TB, up from 2GiB. Note that you may
  have problems when the number of packets gets larger than 2^31^ or 2^32^,
  though that is also true when no limit is set.

* When capturing files in multiple file mode, a pattern that places the date and time
  before the index number can be used (e.g., foo_20240714110102_00001.pcap instead of
  foo_00001_20240714110102.pcap). This makes file names sortable in chronological order
  across file sets from different captures. The "File Set" dialog has been updated to
  handle the new pattern, which has been capable of being produced by tshark since
  version 3.6.0.

* Adding interfaces at startup is about twice as fast, and has many fewer
  UAC pop-ups when Npcap is installed with access restricted to Administrators
  on Windows.

* The Lua version included with the Windows and macOS installers has been updated to 5.4.
  While we have tried to help with backward compatibility by including lua_bitop library with
  Lua 5.3 and 5.4 in addition to the native Lua support for bit operations
  present in those versions, different versions of Lua are not guaranteed to
  be compatible. If a Lua dissector has issues, check the manuals for
  https://www.lua.org/manual/5.4/manual.html#8[Lua 5.4],
  https://www.lua.org/manual/5.3/manual.html#8[Lua 5.3], and
  https://www.lua.org/manual/5.2/manual.html#8[Lua 5.2] for
  incompatibilities and suggested workarounds. Note that features marked as
  deprecated in one version are removed in the subsequent version without
  additional notice, so it can be worth checking the manual for previous versions.

* Lua scripts in the plugins directories are now initially loaded via the same
  internal Lua methods as `require()`. This avoids errors from loading plugins
  twice, once by scanning the directory initially, and once by `require()`,
  and also results in globals defined in plugins entering the global namespace.
  Previously globals defined in plugins only entered the global namespace when
  placed in the global plugins directory, but not the personal plugins directory.
  Using globals in plugins remains deprecated style (both by Wireshark and in Lua
  generally), that should be avoided via using other methods. wsbuglink:18589[]

* Lua functions have been added to decompress and decode TvbRanges with other
  compression types besides zlib, such as Brotli, Snappy, Zstd, and others,
  matching the support in the C API. tvbrange:uncompress() has been deprecated
  in favor of tvbrange:uncompress_zlib().

* Lua Dumper now defaults to the pcapng file type, and to per-packet
  encapsulation (creating interfaces on demand as necessary) when writing
  pcapng wsbuglink:16403[]

* Editcap has an `--extract-secrets` option to extract embedded decryption
  secrets from a capture file. wsbuglink:18197[]

* Global profiles can be used in tshark by using `--global-profile` option.

* Capture files can be saved with LZ4 compression. LZ4 has an emphasis on
  speed and may be particularly useful for large files.

* Fast random access is supported with LZ4 compressed files when compressed
  with independent blocks, which is the default. This provides much more
  responsive GUI performance when jumping to different packets. Fast random
  access has been supported with gzip compressed files since version 1.8.0,
  but this is not supported for Zstd compressed files.

* Wireshark's Git repostory tags are now signed using SSH.
  See
  https://www.wireshark.org/docs/wsdg_html_chunked/ChSrcGitRepository.html#ChSrcWebInterface[the Developer's Guide]
  for more details.

=== Removed Features and Support

* The tshark `-G` option with no argument is deprecated and will be removed in
  a future version. Use `tshark -G fields` to produce the same report.

=== Removed Dissectors

The Parlay dissector has been removed.

//=== New File Format Decoding Support

//[commaize]
//--
//--

=== New Protocol Support

// Add one protocol per line between the -- delimiters in the format
// “Full protocol name (Abbreviation)”
// git log --oneline --diff-filter=A --stat v4.3.0rc0.. epan/dissectors plugins
[commaize]
--
Allied Telesis Resiliency Link (AT RL)
ATN Security Label
Bit Index Explicit Replication (BIER)
Bus Mirroring Protocol
EGNOS Message Server (EMS) file format
Galileo E1-B I/NAV navigation messages
IBM i RDMA Endpoint (iRDMA-EDP)
IWBEMSERVICES
MAC NR Framed (mac-nr-framed)
Matter Bluetooth Transport Protocol (MatterBTP)
MiWi P2P Star
Monero
NMEA 0183
PLDM
RDP authentication redirection virtual channel protocol (rdpear)
RF4CE Network Layer (RF4CE)
RF4CE Profile (RF4CE Profile)
RK512
SAP Remote Function Call (SAPRFC)
SBAS L1 Navigation Message
Scanner Access Now Easy (SANE)
TREL
WMIO
ZeroMQ Message Transport Protocol (ZMTP)
--

=== Updated Protocol Support

IPv6: The "show address detail" preference is now enabled by default. The
address details provided have been extended to include more special purpose address
block properties (forwardable, globally-routable, etc).

Too many other protocol updates have been made to list them all here.

//=== New and Updated Capture File Support

// There is no new or updated capture file support in this release.
// Add one file type per line between the -- delimiters.
[commaize]
--
EGNOS Messager Server (EMS) files
--

// === New and Updated Capture Interfaces support
[commaize]
--
u-blox GNSS receivers
--

//=== New and Updated Codec support

//_Non-empty section placeholder._

=== Major API Changes

* The entire code base has been updated to use C99 types instead of GLib types.
This includes changing occurrences `gboolean`, which is an integer, to C99's native `bool` type in many places.

* The `tvb_get_guintX` and `tvb_get_gintX` functions in the tvbuff API have been renamed to `tvb_get_uintX` and `tvb_get_intX` (the GLib-style "g" has been removed).
You can still use the old-style names, but they have been deprecated.

* Plugins should provide a `plugin_describe()` function that returns an ORed
  list of flags consisting of the plugin types used.
  See wsutil/plugins.h for details.

== Getting Wireshark

Wireshark source code and installation packages are available from
https://www.wireshark.org/download.html.

=== Vendor-supplied Packages

Most Linux and Unix vendors supply their own Wireshark packages.
You can usually install or upgrade Wireshark using the package management system specific to that platform.
A list of third-party packages can be found on the
https://www.wireshark.org/download.html[download page]
on the Wireshark web site.

== File Locations

Wireshark and TShark look in several different locations for preference files, plugins, SNMP MIBS, and RADIUS dictionaries.
These locations vary from platform to platform.
You can use menu:Help[About Wireshark,Folders] or `tshark -G folders` to find the default locations on your system.

== Getting Help

The User’s Guide, manual pages and various other documentation can be found at
https://www.wireshark.org/docs/

Community support is available on
https://ask.wireshark.org/[Wireshark’s Q&A site]
and on the wireshark-users mailing list.
Subscription information and archives for all of Wireshark’s mailing lists can be found on https://lists.wireshark.org/lists/[the mailing list site].

Bugs and feature requests can be reported on
https://gitlab.com/wireshark/wireshark/-/issues[the issue tracker].

You can learn protocol analysis and meet Wireshark’s developers at
https://sharkfest.wireshark.org[SharkFest].

// Official Wireshark training and certification are available from
// https://www.wiresharktraining.com/[Wireshark University].

== How You Can Help

The Wireshark Foundation helps as many people as possible understand their networks as much as possible.
You can find out more and donate at https://wiresharkfoundation.org[wiresharkfoundation.org].

== Frequently Asked Questions

A complete FAQ is available on the
https://www.wireshark.org/faq.html[Wireshark web site].
