NETWORK DEVICE

Syntax : DEVICE <device-name>

<device-name>

is the device on witch ipfm will log packets. IPFM monitors only one device.

Time Coordinates

Syntax : [UTC|local]

This decides if IPFM will use UTC or local time in its outputs (log filename and the timestamp inside the file). Default is local.

Note that IPFM works internally with UTC, and that the dates entered in the config file are UTC (see AFTER Syntax).

NEW LOG

Syntax : NEWLOG

This creates a new log entry, where you can define new local variables.

HOSTS TO LOG

ipfm logs only specified hosts.

Syntax: LOG [[NONE|FROM|TO|BOTH] <host>] [[NOT] WITH <host>]

NONE

do not log anything from or to this <host>

FROM

do log packets from this <host>

TO

do log packets to this <host>

BOTH

(default) do log packets from and to this <host>

<host> can be :

x.x.x.x : an IP. x.x.x.x/x.x.x.x : an IP followed by a subnet mask.

WITH

specifies if the packet is ignored (NOT WITH) or logged (WITH), in function of the second IP present in the packet.

Examples :

LOG 10.10.10.0/255.255.255.0 NOT WITH 10.10.10.1
will log any packets from or to hosts in subnet 10.10.10.0/255.255.255.0, except packets involving host 10.10.10.1 .

LOG WITH 10.10.10.23
will log any packets in relation with host 10.10.10.23

LOG
will log everything.

OUTPUT TIME DELAY

ipfm outputs its statistics every fixed period, with the ability to fix an exact time origin and offset, in Coordinated Universal Time (UTC).

Syntax: DUMP EVERY <time> [AFTER <time>]

<time> is composed of :

<number> second(s)
<number> minute(s)
<number> hour(s)
<number> day(s)

Default DUMP time is 24 hours

Default AFTER time is 0 seconds

Examples:

DUMP EVERY 30 minutes
will dump the stats every 30 minutes at x:00 and x:30.

DUMP EVERY 1 hour AFTER 7 minutes
will dump the stats every hour, at 0:07, 1:07, 2:07, and so on, regardless of the time at which ipfm was launched.

DUMP EVERY 1 day AFTER 14 hours
will dump data every day, at 14:00:00 UTC (for France localtime (during the summer), at 16:00:00 +0200)

CLEARING STATS

You may want to clear your statistics sometimes, or after each dump.

Syntax : CLEAR [ ALWAYS | NEVER | EVERY <time> [AFTER <time>] ]

<time> is composed of :

<number> second(s)
<number> minute(s)
<number> hour(s)
<number> day(s)

Default CLEAR mode is ALWAYS. Default AFTER time is 0 seconds. Note that both time values MUST be a multiple of the DUMP delay. Also, this line MUST come after the DUMP line.

Examples

CLEAR ALWAYS
will clear the stats after every DUMP.

CLEAR NEVER
will never clear the stats, which means you are doing incremental statistics.

CLEAR EVERY 30 minutes
will clear the stats every 30 minutes at x:00 and x:30. Note that if your DUMP line had an AFTER value such as 3 minutes, this rule will clear the stats at x:03 and x:33.

CLEAR EVERY 1 hour AFTER 10 minutes
will clear the stats every hour, at 0:10, 1:10, 2:10, and so on. Note that if your DUMP line had an AFTER value such as 3 minutes, this rule will clear the stats at 0:13, 1:13, 2:13 and so on.

LOG FILENAME

Every delay, ipfm writes its output into a file, which name is specified by the rule FILENAME

Syntax: FILENAME <filemask>

<filemask>

is a quoted string (eg. "/path/to/filename") that is parsed using strftime(3) syntax.

Default FILENAME is /var/log/ipfm/%d-%b.%H-%M

NOTE : The file will be overwritten without any check.

REVERSE DNS

You can activate or deactivate reverse DNS in the output file.

WARNING : activating reverse DNS can delay a lot the production of the log file, due to DNS timeouts.

Syntax : [RESOLVE|NORESOLVE]

Default is NORESOLVE

SORT OUTPUT FILE

ipfm can sort output file depending on IN, OUT or TOTAL.

Syntax : SORT IN|OUT|TOTAL

Default is to sort nothing. Please note that this option could delay a bit

the production of the log file.

SET PROMISCUOUS MODE

You can choose to log all packets on the network (default) or only packets which destination is your network device.

This option could also be useful if you wish to set the promiscuous mode yourself (ifconfig eth0 [-]promisc), as the promisc mode is very badly handled under Linux.

Please note that under Linux, if you run a program that sets the promiscuous mode (for example tcpdump), ipfm will also see its network interface set into promiscuous mode.

Syntax [NO]PROMISC

Default is PROMISC

APPEND OR REPLACE LOG FILES

You can choose to append the output to an existing logfile or to replace the old file by a new one.

Syntax : APPEND|REPLACE

Default is REPLACE