home *** CD-ROM | disk | FTP | other *** search
- Short: Netcat v1.10 - network data read/write tool
- Type: comm/net
- Uploaded: louise@louise.amiga.hu (LouiSe)
-
- No modification needed, just a "make generic" to compile...
-
- Ported by LouiSe
-
- more info and other AMIGA ports at:
- http://louise.amiga.hu
-
- -----------------------------------------
-
- Netcat 1.10
- =========== /\_/\
- / 0 0 \
- Netcat is a simple Unix utility which reads and writes data ====v====
- across network connections, using TCP or UDP protocol. \ W /
- It is designed to be a reliable "back-end" tool that can | | _
- be used directly or easily driven by other programs and / ___ \ /
- scripts. At the same time, it is a feature-rich network / / \ \ |
- debugging and exploration tool, since it can create almost (((-----)))-'
- any kind of connection you would need and has several /
- interesting built-in capabilities. Netcat, or "nc" as the ( ___
- actual program is named, should have been supplied long ago \__.=|___E
- as another one of those cryptic but standard Unix tools. /
-
- In the simplest usage, "nc host port" creates a TCP connection to the given
- port on the given target host. Your standard input is then sent to the host,
- and anything that comes back across the connection is sent to your standard
- output. This continues indefinitely, until the network side of the connection
- shuts down. Note that this behavior is different from most other applications
- which shut everything down and exit after an end-of-file on the standard input.
-
- Netcat can also function as a server, by listening for inbound connections
- on arbitrary ports and then doing the same reading and writing. With minor
- limitations, netcat doesn't really care if it runs in "client" or "server"
- mode -- it still shovels data back and forth until there isn't any more left.
- In either mode, shutdown can be forced after a configurable time of inactivity
- on the network side.
-
- And it can do this via UDP too, so netcat is possibly the "udp telnet-like"
- application you always wanted for testing your UDP-mode servers. UDP, as the
- "U" implies, gives less reliable data transmission than TCP connections and
- some systems may have trouble sending large amounts of data that way, but it's
- still a useful capability to have.
-
- You may be asking "why not just use telnet to connect to arbitrary ports?"
- Valid question, and here are some reasons. Telnet has the "standard input
- EOF" problem, so one must introduce calculated delays in driving scripts to
- allow network output to finish. This is the main reason netcat stays running
- until the *network* side closes. Telnet also will not transfer arbitrary
- binary data, because certain characters are interpreted as telnet options and
- are thus removed from the data stream. Telnet also emits some of its
- diagnostic messages to standard output, where netcat keeps such things
- religiously separated from its *output* and will never modify any of the real
- data in transit unless you *really* want it to. And of course telnet is
- incapable of listening for inbound connections, or using UDP instead. Netcat
- doesn't have any of these limitations, is much smaller and faster than telnet,
- and has many other advantages.
-
- Some of netcat's major features are:
-
- Outbound or inbound connections, TCP or UDP, to or from any ports
- Full DNS forward/reverse checking, with appropriate warnings
- Ability to use any local source port
- Ability to use any locally-configured network source address
- Built-in port-scanning capabilities, with randomizer
- Built-in loose source-routing capability
- Can read command line arguments from standard input
- Slow-send mode, one line every N seconds
- Hex dump of transmitted and received data
- Optional ability to let another program service established connections
- Optional telnet-options responder
-