Packet Strata

A high-performance packet parsing library and PCAP reader for Rust.

Workspace Structure

This repository is organized as a Cargo workspace containing:

• packet-strata-lib/ - Core packet parsing library

  • Zero-copy packet parsing
  • Support for multiple protocols (Ethernet, IPv4/IPv6, TCP, UDP, tunnels, etc.)
  • Iterator-based and full-packet parsing modes

• pcap-reader/ - Command-line PCAP file analyzer

  • Reads PCAP and PCAPNG files
  • Provides detailed packet statistics
  • High-performance packet processing

Building

Build the library (default):

cargo build --release

Build the entire workspace (library + pcap-reader):

cargo build --release --workspace

Build only the library:

cargo build --release -p packet-strata

Build only the pcap-reader:

cargo build --release -p pcap-reader

Usage

Using the Library

Add to your Cargo.toml:

[dependencies]
packet-strata = "0.1" 

Note: When adding packet-strata as a dependency, only the library will be built. The pcap-reader binary is excluded from default builds and won't be compiled unless explicitly requested with cargo build --workspace or cargo build -p pcap-reader.

Using the PCAP Reader

# Basic usage
cargo run -p pcap-reader -- -p path/to/file.pcap

# With statistics
cargo run -p pcap-reader -- -p path/to/file.pcap --stats

# Dump packet contents
cargo run -p pcap-reader -- -p path/to/file.pcap --dump-packet

# Use full packet parsing (instead of iterator mode)
cargo run -p pcap-reader -- -p path/to/file.pcap --full-parse

Or after building:

./target/release/pcap-reader --help

Features

Supported Protocols

Link Layer:

• Ethernet
• Linux Cooked Capture (SLL/SLLv2)
• Null/Loopback

Network Layer:

• IPv4
• IPv6
• ARP
• MPLS

Transport Layer:

• TCP
• UDP
• SCTP
• ICMP/ICMPv6

Tunnel Protocols:

• VXLAN
• Geneve
• GRE/NVGRE
• MPLS
• Teredo
• GTPv1/GTPv2
• L2TPv2/L2TPv3
• PBB
• STT
• PPTP
• IP-in-IP (IPIP, SIT, IP4in6, IP6Tnl)

License

MIT

Author

Nicola Bonelli nicola.bonelli@larthia.com