Monitoring WiFi devices from the command line
Programming Snapshot – Go WiFi Monitor
© Lead Image © Sergey Nivens, 123RF.com
To see when clients are joining and leaving the wireless network, Mike Schilli writes a command-line utility that uses an object-relational mapping interface to store metrics in SQLite to later display historical data.
"What I don't know won't hurt me," as the saying goes, but the reverse is true for my wireless network. What are all my household gadgets doing? After all, no newly released device seems to be able to manage without a wireless network connection nowadays. Or are there actually some devices that I don't even know about? This definitely worries me and keeps me tossing and turning in my sleep.
On top of that, I am interested in more than the current situation. Curious by nature, I would like to know how long a device, once discovered, has been operating on the network, when it joined the network, and whether it is permanently active or occasionally lets its assigned IP address lease expire and then picks up a new one later. Let's build a data logger in Go to find out.
To detect active devices on the wireless network, it makes sense to call up the nmap scanner. This hacking tool is included with every good Linux distribution and knocks on the door of all potentially usable IP addresses in a subnet to see if a host responds. On a typical 192.168.0.0/24 subnet of a router for home network use, you can use 255 IP addresses, and nmap scans them with a barrage of probes at lightning speed (Figure 1).
[...]
Buy this article as PDF
(incl. VAT)
Buy Linux Magazine
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Support Our Work
Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you’ve found an article to be beneficial.
News
-
Chaos Comes to KDE in KaOS
KaOS devs are making a major change to the distribution, and it all comes down to one system.
-
New Linux Botnet Discovered
The SSHStalker botnet uses IRC C2 to control systems via legacy Linux kernel exploits.
-
The Next Linux Kernel Turns 7.0
Linus Torvalds has announced that after Linux kernel 6.19, we'll finally reach the 7.0 iteration stage.
-
Linux From Scratch Drops SysVinit Support
LFS will no longer support SysVinit.
-
LibreOffice 26.2 Now Available
With new features, improvements, and bug fixes, LibreOffice 26.2 delivers a modern, polished office suite without compromise.
-
Linux Kernel Project Releases Project Continuity Document
What happens to Linux when there's no Linus? It's a question many of us have asked over the years, and it seems it's also on the minds of the Linux kernel project.
-
Mecha Systems Introduces Linux Handheld
Mecha Systems has revealed its Mecha Comet, a new handheld computer powered by – you guessed it – Linux.
-
MX Linux 25.1 Features Dual Init System ISO
The latest release of MX Linux caters to lovers of two different init systems and even offers instructions on how to transition.
-
Photoshop on Linux?
A developer has patched Wine so that it'll run specific versions of Photoshop that depend on Adobe Creative Cloud.
-
Linux Mint 22.3 Now Available with New Tools
Linux Mint 22.3 has been released with a pair of new tools for system admins and some pretty cool new features.