Quick Start - Linux

This guide will help you install and build your first PcapPlusPlus application on Linux in a few simple steps.

Table of contents

1. Step 1 - install PcapPlusPlus
2. Step 2 - create your first app
3. Step 3 - create a Makefile
4. Step 4 - build and run your app

Step 1 - install PcapPlusPlus

Before installing PcapPlusPlus make sure you have the prerequisites installed for Linux.

Pre-compiled packages are available for recent versions of Ubuntu, Fedora and CentOS. You can find them under the v21.05 release page. After downloading and extracting the archive file go to: /path/to/your/package/ and run the installation script:

./install.sh

Another option is using Homebrew on Linux if you have it installed on your system:

brew install pcapplusplus

If you have other Linux distribution, another version of the distribution mentioned above or other GCC version you’ll need to build PcapPlusPlus from source. Make sure not to skip the installation part.

Step 2 - create your first app

If you downloaded a pre-compiled package go to: /path/to/your/package/example-app.

If you built it from source go to: /path/to/pcapplusplus/source/Tutorials/Tutorial-HelloWorld.

Make sure you see the following files:

 |-- main.cpp
 |-- 1_packet.pcap

main.cpp is the example application we’ll use.

1_packet.pcap is a pcap file the app reads from.

Step 3 - create a Makefile

If you downloaded a pre-compiled package you can find a Makefile in /path/to/your/package/example-app. This Makefile is already configured.

If you built it from source:

• go to /path/to/pcapplusplus/source/Tutorials/Tutorial-HelloWorld
• rename Makefile.non_windows to Makefile

Step 4 - build and run your app

Run make to build the app:

$ make

An executable file will be created which contains the compiled app. You can now run it and should be able to see the following output:

Source IP is '10.0.0.138'; Dest IP is '10.0.0.1'