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RIP Ethereal, Long Live Wireshark
teknogeek0 writes "From Newsforge (also owned by OSTG), it appears that popular open source network traffic analyzer Ethereal has changed it's name to Wireshark. The surprising move was due to Gerald Combs, the founder of the project, changing jobs and having to leave the Ethereal trademark behind. From the article: 'I recently accepted a job with CACE Technologies, best known for WinPcap .... The move also means a major change for the project. We're continuing development under the name Wireshark, at http://www.wireshark.org/. The web site, mailing lists, bug tracker, SVN repository, buildbot, and other resources are already in place.'"
Reminds me of Gameshark... I think they could have done a better job renaming it.
Ryan - http://www.thecosmotron.com/
Maybe you should change the old URL to http://www.ethereal./ com/
This program has GOT to be one of the best cross-platform packet analysis programs available. I've used it on everything from Windows 98 to XP to MacOS to Linux, and it's the same interface for all. I'm glad to see it's not a TRUE R.I.P. Live on, Go Strong!
Ethereal is at www.ethereal.com, not at www.ethereal.org.
-- "So they told me that using the download page to download something was not something they anticipated." - Bill Gates
In other news, scientists have invented a time machine that allows people to travel back to when they are fourteen, a time when names like shark and Kill3r are cool.
"Oh boy"
Ethereal.org is definitely not a packet capture utility. Ethereal.com is what's sniffing the glue that holds the internet together.
Pound! Bang! Bin! Bash! is this a shell script or a Batman comic?
NotSniffer
ThatProgramThatCanSeeEverything
EtherFAKE
TCPDUMPONSPEED
does his old job own the trademark or something?
I cannot understand why the company would want to hold onto the Ethereal trademark if the development of the project is moving to a new name. A trademark is, by definition, a MARK that you are TRADING under, so unless they are planning on continuing the project (a fork), there is no value to the mark.
So the only thing that makes sense to me is that they plan on forking the project and continuing the development - which really would not make sense, as the odds are such a move would be viewed with great disdain by the community, and in all likelihood the project will be outstripped by the new Wireshark project.
www.eFax.com are spammers
Though I guess "WireShark" kinda has a "kewl" ring to it, I'm a bit concerned because, let's face it, a shark is a predator. So you have to explain to people why you want to run some predatory application that captures packets on a network. At least with the old name you can say "hey, it's a diagnostic tool" without people giving you a "yeah, right" look that you'll now get with WireShark.
All this time it didn't support Router Information Protocol?
I'd change my name, too...
FIXME: Add a sig here
Hmmm. Ok, those are crap, so I guess Wireshark isn't too awful.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
And I for one welcome our new cartilaginous overlords....
-- "Most people prefer a popular myth to an unpopular truth"
"Did you mean: Wereshark"
A couple of years ago the OpenBSD folks yanked Ethereal out of their ports tree, complaining of a terrifying number of exploits and a fix rate that didn't meet their expectations. Did that change?
I don't know why people give so much credence to Coverity. I don't see how it could possibly know what are bugs and what aren't. Didn't mathematicians and computer science people show this already as the Halting Problem? "Bugs per line of code" from a program is a ridiculous measurement to use.
I've never used Coverity since it's impossible to get the program, but it wouldn't surprise me if it called anything that wasn't safe or good coding style a "bug". Like, yell at you if you use "strcpy". Or if you don't check for a NULL pointer when it can't be.
What sucks is that some businesses in which the managers aren't programmers are starting to require that all code checked in pass tests of this kind with no exceptions. It hasn't happened at my company yet, thankfully.
Of course, this comes from someone writing assembly language on a regular basis. >_
Melissa
"Screw Sun, cross-platform will never work. Let's move on and steal the Java language." - Visual J++ Product Manager
I thought this code jumped the shark a while ago.
Ethereal(tm) by NIS may turn into some cookware for all we know, but one thing is clear; GPL. Ethereal/WireShark was released under GPL, and name change will not affect the direction of development (as far as I know). Only thing uncertain here is what NIS will do with the name Ethereal(tm).
NIS may hire new developers and continue on where Combs left off. In this case, NIS may come out as Ethereal(tm) main branch, and WireShark may be seen as fork even though CACE is the one with original project lead, Combs. Either case, both under GPL, Combs may have some tough time convincing distros from including two seperate ethereal products. This fact alone and its outcome will be very interesting.
NIS may drop development and stop the contribution to the code branch and develop entirely new product and license. This case, it will be a name only product and hopefully community will make a swift change to WireShark in order to make the transition quick and painless. Worst case senario, I can think of Xorg and X11 case where most distros had tough time switching from X11 to Xorg fork while making crosslink compatible and transparent.
I may be wrong on this, so I'll let Combs and NIS correct me.
"Don't let fools fool you. They are the clever ones."
I mean, I've probably only used ethereal ten times in my life, but I always loved the name. Damn. Wireshark is a horrid name, jeebus.
Salut,
Jacques
"There are two kinds of people. Sheep and sharks. Anyone who is a sheep is fired. Who is a sheep?"