Contents

The following Help Topics are available:

About net.demon - About the software

Readme - Release notes for this version (0.95 beta)

Registration - Registration info.  Cheap!

Tools

  Finger - get information about a user on a remote system

  Whois - get information from a user database

  Traceroute- trace the route to a remote host

  DNS Lookup - look up information in the Domain Name System

 Ping - ping a server to see if it is alive

 IP Resolve - resolve an IP address or domain name

Tasks

IDENTD Server - run an authentication server

IDENTD Query - query an authentication server

Port Watcher - watch a port for activity

Address Scan - scan a range of IP addresses

URL Grabber - read an URL via HTTP

Time Sync - synchronize your clock with a time server

Info

System - get information about your winsock implementation

Protocols - list protocols known by your system

Port Services - list port services known by your system

Quote - get the quote of the day from a quote server

Netstat - check network status of a system

Sysstat - check system status of a system

For Help on Help, Press F1


Menus

The following Help Topics are available:

  File Menu

  Edit Menu

View Menu

Tools Menu

Tasks Menu

Info Menu


Registration

Registration will get rid of the nag screen and enable some additional features.  As new features are added, they will only be enabled in the registered version.

This one time registration entitles you to a lifetime of free upgrades.  When the registered version is complete, you will be sent your ID and password to download it from my site.

The registration cost is $15.  Please send your payment, along with your e-mail address, desired username and password to:

net.demon software

P.O. Box 307

Union, MO  63084

Dont forget my no-suck guarantee!  If you find something in the software that sucks, tell me and Ill fix it (registered users only).


Readme

Release notes.

This is the beta version pre-release of net.demon.  It is for evaluation purposes only, so I can get feedback from users.  A final release version will be made available at the web site which will contain the registration code.  Registering will get rid of the nag screen and enable some additional features.  As new features are added, they will only be accessible in registered versions.

This beta version does not include an installer.  Put everything from the .zip file in the desired directory.  Locate the netdemon.exe file with the Windows Explorer, right click, and choose Create Shortcut.  You can now drag this shortcut into your start menu.

Commercial distribution of this software is prohibited without a prior agreement.

Please report any bugs to me at:

netdemon@trib.net

The latest version will always be available at:

http://netdemon.simplenet.com/

If you havent checked out the Registration information, please take time to look at it now.


Finger

FINGER allows a client to find out information about another user on a remote system.

The query format is:

user@host.com

to find out information about a particular user, or just

host.com

to find out about all the users.  Some systems respond differently to the query

@host.com

and net.demon correctly handles either type.

Some interesting accounts to try and finger:

root@host.com

Specifications

RFC 1288 - The Finger User Information Protocol


Whois

WHOIS allows a client to find out information about a user provided in a systems database.

This application contacts the whois server at InterNIC Registration Services by default, allowing the user to find out all the information known about a particular domain.

Its also possible to find out who a particuar IP address is administered by.  Just type the IP address in the whois field.

Some systems implement WHOIS to give information about a particular user.  In that case, change the Server to the host you want to query, and enter the name or user in the Whois.

hint:  leave the query field blank and press OK to get general information and help from the Whois server.

Specifications

RFC 954 - NICNAME/WHOIS

RFC 1834 - Whois and Network Information Lookup Service


Traceroute

This traces the route to a particular host using ICMP Echo packets.  One of the options in an ICMP packet is TTL or time to live.  As an ICMP packet passes through each system, the time to live for that packet is decremented by one.  If the result is zero, the packet is discarded and an error message is sent back to the originator.  In this manner, by using sending out packets with sequentially greater TTL values, the program can receive error messages from each host along the path to a particular destination.

Wait - time to wait for the result, in seconds

Hops - maximum number of jumps to try and reach the host

Probes - number of probes to send out for each server

Port - port to originate packets from

Error messages:

!Net - host unreachable from this location

Specifications

RFC 792 - INTERNET CONTROL MESSAGE PROTOCOL


DNS Lookup

This allows you to access the Domain Name System, to get information about a particular domain name.  The types of records you can look up are:

A - Host address

NS - Authoritative name server

HINFO - Host information

MINFO - Mailbox or mail list information

MX - Mail exchange

SOA - Start of authority information

TXT - Text string

AXFR - Zone transfer request

Any particular DNS server may not contain all the information about the domain in question, if that is the case it will list the authoritative name servers that have the requested information.

Options:

Verbose - Show detailed information about all the records returned

Recursion - Allow the server to contact other servers to find the information

Specifications

RFC 1034 - DOMAIN NAMES - CONCEPTS AND FACILITIES

RFC 1035 - DOMAIN NAMES - IMPLEMENTATION AND SPECIFICATION


IP Resolver

Either resolves a domain name into an IP address, or an IP address into a domain name.

Specifications

RFC 1034 - DOMAIN NAMES - CONCEPTS AND FACILITIES

RFC 1035 - DOMAIN NAMES - IMPLEMENTATION AND SPECIFICATION


About net.demon

Welcome to net.demon!


Services

This queries the getservbyport() function for all the well-known services ports 1-1023.

Specifications

RFC 1700 - ASSIGNED NUMBERS


Protocols

This queries the getprotobynumber() function for the first 255 protocols.

Specifications

RFC 1700 - ASSIGNED NUMBERS


RFC (Request For Comments)

What are all those RFC numbers at the bottom of the help topics?  Those are a series of numbered documents that describe how internet protocols work in detail.  You can find the latest RFCs and other related documents at:

http://ds.internic.net/ds/dspg0intdoc.html

An individual RFC can be located by replacing the ### characters:

http://ds.internic.net/rfc/rfc###.txt


Ping

This sends ICMP Echo packets to a host to determine if it is reachable.

Specifications

RFC 792 - INTERNET CONTROL MESSAGE PROTOCOL


System Info

This displays the following information:

The information returned by your Winsock implementation (version, etc)

Types of sockets supported

Local host (in your system settings)

IP Address

Resolved host


Hints

Hints on how to get the most out of net.demon:

Double-clicking - You can double-click on a domain, IP address, or URL to hilight the whole thing.

Help - press F1 at any time for help on the current task.

Right click - you can bring up a context menu by clicking the right mouse button.


Address Scan

This can be used to scan a range of IP addresses, performing the following functions:

1.  Resolve the IP address to find out the domain name,

2.  Ping the address to see if a system is running there, or

3.  Both resolve and ping the address

Start, End - Enter the range of IP address to scan here.  (Hint - you can just specify a domain name in the Start section, press enter, and it will automatically set the range for the subnet containing that domain).

Verbose - check this box to list all addresses scanned, whether any information is returned or not.

Resolve - check this box to resolve the IP address into a domain name

Ping - check this box to ping the address, see if a system is responding

Wait - amount of time to wait for a ping response, in seconds

Specifications

RFC 792 - INTERNET CONTROL MESSAGE PROTOCOL

RFC 1034 - DOMAIN NAMES - CONCEPTS AND FACILITIES

RFC 1035 - DOMAIN NAMES - IMPLEMENTATION AND SPECIFICATION


IDENTD Server

The Identification Protocol (a.k.a., "ident", a.k.a., "Authorization") provides a means to determine the identity of a user of a  particular TCP connection.  Given a TCP port number pair, it returns a character string which identifies the owner of that connection on the server's system.

This implementation of the server doesnt check the TCP connection or port numbers, it just returns the string to anyone whether or not they are actually connected.  This is useful in situations where an IDENT server is required but doesnt need to be perfect, such as IRC servers.

Also, some web sites will perform an IDENT request on all users who connect, running this server is a good way to keep an eye on them.

User - enter the name you want to respond with

hint:  enter !random to generate a random string each time (note: this is a great idea to foil web sites that are trying to gather information on you, but a bad idea when using IRC, if you use bots that expect a certain user name in your hostmask)

System - type of system you want to claim you are running on, usually UNIX

Port - port to run the server on, usually 113

See also: IDENTD Query

Specifications

RFC 1413 - Identification Protocol


IDENTD Query

The Identification Protocol (a.k.a., "ident", a.k.a., "Authorization") provides a means to determine the identity of a user of a particular TCP connection.  Given a TCP port number pair, it returns a character string which identifies the owner of that connection on the server's system.

IDENT servers run on port 113.

This tool is used to query an IDENT server on a remote system.  It will not work on Unix systems unless you are currently connected and know both the local and remote ports being used.  It will work on other types of IDENT servers such as those included in an IRC client, which will return a string to anyone, whether or not they are actually connected.

See also: IDENTD Server

Specifications

RFC 1413 - Identification Protocol


Time Sync

Time Sync uses a variety of protocols to get the time from a remote server.  Use the Query button to just get the remote time or Sync to set your system clock according to the new time.

The Latency tells the round-trip time to query the server, in milliseconds.  The time received from the server is then automatically adjusted by half this value.

The Time protocol returns the Greenwich Mean Time, which is then adjusted to your local  time zone.

The Daytime protocol returns the time as a text string, which may or may not specify the time zone.  If no time zone is specified, the time will not be adjusted to the local one.  Then, the time sync will only adjust the minute and seconds, leaving the hour alone.

Using HTTP will get the time from any web server

Specifications

RFC 867 - Daytime Protocol

RFC 868 - Time Protocol


Character Generator

(New topic text goes here.)

Specifications

RFC 864 - Character Generator Protocol


URL Reader

This reads a web page from a web server.

Specifications

draft-ietf-http-v10-spec-05.txt - Internet Draft

RFC 1808, 1738 - URLs


Quote of the Day

Gets a short text string from a remote server.  If anyone knows of any servers that actually still run this service, please let me know so I can add it to the list.

Specifications

RFC 865 - Quote of the Day Protocol


Netstat

(New topic text goes here.)


Systat

(New topic text goes here.)


Verify E-Mail address

This tool connects to a mail server to try and determine the validity of a given e-mail address.  If no mail server allows you to connect at the domain, try adding mail in front of it, i.e. user@mail.domain.com.  If all else fails, use the DNS tool to look up the mail exchangers for the domain of interest.

Specifications

RFC 821 - Simple Mail Transfer Protocol

RFC 1869 - SMTP-EXT

RFC 822 - Format of Electronic Mail Messages


Port Watcher

(New topic text goes here.)