Re: Wireshark 1.8.0 is now available

[Guy Harris <guy () alum mit edu>]

On Nov 22, 2012, at 2:45 AM, Matteo Arnò <matteo.arno () gmail com> wrote:

> hopefully this hasn't been already asked (I did some research but could not find an answer).
>
> With the introduction of "Export Specified Packets", I could not find a way to export a list of packets into plain 
> text.

"Export Specified Packets" was introduced as the result of splitting "Save As" into a function to save the current 
state of the current capture into a file ("Save As") and a function to save specified packets to a capture file 
("Export Specified Packets").  The two functions were both done by "Save As" prior to 1.8, but, as Wireshark is now an 
"editor", starting in 1.8.0, because it lets you add comments to, remove comments from, and edit comments in a capture 
file, a "Save" operation to save out the edited version was needed, and a "Save As" operation that behaved like Save 
but to a different file was also needed.

"Export Specified Packets" was added to provide the same function that "Save As" performed if you didn't specify all 
packets.  (It also lets you save out *all* the packets to a separate file, but, as it's not "Save As", doesn't make 
that new file the current capture file; this change makes a clear distinction between operations that always save all 
packets and make the resulting file the current capture file, namely "Save" and "Save As", and operations that can be 
made to save only some packets and that do *not* make the resulting file the current capture file, namely "Export 
Specified Packets".  This eliminates some potential UI confusion - which I think ended up being *real* UI confusion 
when some users tried the 1.7.x builds out.)

"Save As" just saves out binary packets to a capture file, so "Export Specified Packets" only does so as well; it was 
not intended to save dissected packet data in text form.

> I can do "export packet dissection" as plain text, but this is just too much data that i don't need, I only want the 
> packet list (that you get, for example) by right clicking on a packet and selecting "copy - Summary (text)"... I just 
> want to be able to do it for all the displayed packets.

"Export Packet Dissections -> as "Plain Text" file", in 1.8.0 and later, is the function that was called "Export -> as 
"Plain Text" file" prior to 1.8.0.  It works the same as "Export -> as "Plain Text" file", in that it pops up a dialog 
letting you specify whether to write out the summary information or not, whether to write out the packet details or 
not, and whether to write out the hex data or not.

So, as Sake Blok noted, you use "Export Packet Dissection -> as "Plain Text" file" and just select "Packet summary 
information", just as, prior to 1.8.0, you used "Export -> as "Plain Text" file" and just selected "Packet summary 
information".  The only thing that changed in that respect in 1.8.0 was that we moved some items in the "Export" menu 
up to the top level, in the same group as "Export", leaving only the items that exported the results of packet 
dissection, and renamed "Export" to "Export Packet Dissection".  This meant that we didn't lump operations that 
performed very different operations under a single "Export" menu, but, instead, made the ones that *didn't* export the 
results of packet dissection separate top-level items (making them a bit easier to find) or put them under separate 
top-level items (such as "Export Objects").  This was also done to reduce some UI confusion that people reported.
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