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SPECIFICTION
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PAL (Pcap Analysis Library)

github.com

Linux
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Spec score 6.6 #30 of 32 in Network Packet Analyzer Software

Spec sheet

Purpose
PAL is a Rust framework and toolset for analyzing Pcap files.Read 8 Oct 2026 · github.com
Intended users
The project is aimed at users analyzing packet captures and developers building plugins for network data analysis.Read 7 Oct 2026 · github.com
License
The project is offered under either the Apache License 2.0 or the MIT license.Read 8 Oct 2026 · github.com
Maker
The GitHub organization describes rusticata as a safe parsers community.Read 8 Oct 2026 · github.com
Build
The README describes building the tools with Cargo in release or debug mode.Read 8 Oct 2026 · github.com
Build and use
The README describes building with Cargo and running the pcap-analyzer command on PCAP files.Read 7 Oct 2026 · github.com
Concurrency
Analysis can use worker threads, with packets from a connection dispatched to the same worker to preserve order.Read 8 Oct 2026 · github.com
Linux dependency example
The live-capture instructions show installing libpcap-dev with apt-get.Read 8 Oct 2026 · github.com
Live capture
Experimental live packet capture is available when built with the live feature and the required dependencies.Read 8 Oct 2026 · github.com
Live capture permissions
Live capture requires CAP_NET_RAW and may require CAP_NET_ADMIN to list interfaces.Read 8 Oct 2026 · github.com
Packet reconstruction
It reconstructs network data across layers and is designed to handle fragmentation, missing data, and encapsulation.Read 8 Oct 2026 · github.com
Parallelism
The analyzer supports worker threads, while its documented default concurrency is one thread.Read 7 Oct 2026 · github.com
Plugin limitation
Plugins are embedded in the resulting library, and dynamic libraries are not supported.Read 8 Oct 2026 · github.com
Plugins
Plugins can process data at network layers and respond to flow creation and destruction events.Read 8 Oct 2026 · github.com
Release availability
The GitHub Releases page says there are no releases for the repository.Read 8 Oct 2026 · github.com
Tools
The project includes a main analyzer executable, libraries for analysis and file manipulation, a Pcap rewrite tool, and a debugging analyzer.Read 8 Oct 2026 · github.com

Where Specifiction places it

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