freebsd/contrib/libpcap/TODO

 TODO list for libpcap
=======================

Important stuff (to be done before the next release)
---------------

General

- configure should not be in the CVS. Most open source projects have an 
  autogen.sh script to run autoconf etc. after checkout. I think we 
  should stick to the standard. 

- The source files should be better documented. There is no official 
  design guideline for what is done where. There should be a common coding
  style (okay, you can guess that by looking at the code) and a guide for
  what needs to be documented.

Linux kernel interface

- Currently there is a race condition in that a socket is activated at the
  same time it is opened - before applying a filter. This has to
  be corrected so that capture starts when pcap_read is called for the 
  first time. 

Less urgent items
-----------------

- Better documentation and cleanup of the interface. I am seeing a few  
  problems at the first glance which needs fixing:
  + pcap_lookupnet makes little to no sense with protocols != IPv4
  + not very well suited for interactive programs (think ethereal). There
    should be a way for the application to get a file descriptor which it
    has to monitor and a callback in pcap which has to be called on
    activity (XXX - "pcap_fileno()" handles the first part, although
    "select()" and "poll()" don't work on BPF devices on most BSDs, and
    you can call "pcap_dispatch()" as the dispatch routine after putting
    the descriptor into non-blocking mode)
  + too many functions. There are a lot of functions for everything which
    violates the KISS principle. Why do we need pcap_strerror, pcap_perror
    and pcap_geterr?
  + the manpage has a brief description of each function but where is the
    big picture? Seems like you need to buy UNP for that...