BroadCasting - broadcasting

Ok in order to broadcast, I have created a socket:
notifySock = new Socket(AddressFamily.InterNetwork, SocketType.Dgram, ProtocolType.Udp);
And to send the hostname of my computer to all other computers connected to the same lan, I am using the send(Byte[] buffer) method:
notifySock.Send(hostBuffer);
hostBuffer contains the hostname of my computer.
However because I am using a 'datagram' socket-type do I need to format the data I need to send.
If possible please provide the code that I must put in between the two lines of code I have entered to create a socket and send the data.

For broadcast from a user application, UDP is typically used. You need to design a suitable protocol, i.e. a way to format the information you want to send into the UDP packet.

In your example you haven't specified who you are sending to. You need something like:
UdpClient notifySock = new UdpClient(endPoint);
notifySock.Send(buffer, buffer.Length, new IPEndPoint(IPAddress.Broadcast, 1234));
For the other hosts on your LAN to receive that they have to be listening on UDP port 1234.

Related

Raw socket for transport layer protocol

What I want to do is make my own transport layer protocol in C++. I can't figure out how to create a raw socket that that automatically resolves IP headers, and leaves it up to me to set the payload.
I managed to receive packets on the server using
socket(AF_PACKET, SOCK_RAW, htons(ETH_P_IP))
but didn't manage to create a client that can send data to the server. (I'm not even sure if the above socket is L2 or L3)
From what I understand from reading about raw sockets, a L3 socket would look like
socket(AF_INET, SOCK_RAW, protocol)
Thing is, I don't know what to fill in for the protocol, if my intention is to create my own and not to use existing ones. (I have tried many of the iana numbers, including the range 143-252)
So the question is: how to create a socket, server and client sided, on top of the Internet Protocol such that two computers can communicate in an arbitrary protocol (or send data to each other)? In other words, I want to specify the end IP address and a payload and have the socket take care of the IP header.
What I have now:
server.cpp: https://pastebin.com/yLMFLDmJ
client.cpp: https://pastebin.com/LWuNdqPT
For those who are searching, here is the solution I found: http://www.pdbuchan.com/rawsock/rawsock.html
In the file tcp4.c on the above mentioned page, there is a client implementation using a raw socket. The code adds both IP and TCP headers, but you can simply remove the lines where the TCP headers are added and replace them with your own protocol. You also need to change this line: iphdr.ip_p = IPPROTO_TCP to iphdr.ip_p = 200 (200 or any number in the range 143-252; see https://www.iana.org/assignments/protocol-numbers/protocol-numbers.xhtml) and set the name of the interface you are using, as well as change the addresses.
So here is a stripped down version with the mentioned changes that sends an IP packet only containing IP headers: https://pastebin.com/z2sGmtQd
And here is a very simple server that can receive these packets: https://pastebin.com/jJgZUv5p

How to transfer Data between Android devices using wifi direct?

I need to pass String values to the devices connected through Wifi-Direct..how can i pass string between two connected device..I am using Wifi-Direct file transfer example available as reference.
In doInBackground method of FileServerAsyncTask I am using the code
ServerSocket serverSocket = new ServerSocket(8988);
Socket client = serverSocket.accept();
PrintWriter out = new PrintWriter(client.getOutputStream(),true);
BufferedReader in = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(client.getInputStream()));
How do i modify onHandleIntent method? Any reference to this kind of implementation will be helpful. Thanks
There are some things that you should consider while sending data via wifi direct
Once connected, one device will be group owner and the other will be client
The group owner will have fixed IP address i.e. 192.168.49.1
You will know which became group owner only at runtime.
Once connected, you have to send some data from client to server that contains information about its IP address. This is done because server will have no idea of client's IP address.
That way, you can only send data. Because, by this time you will know which device has what IP address.
Cheers.

Get TCP address information in ZeroMQ

I want to connect clients to a server using ZeroMQ (java bindings, jzmq), but I need the TCP information badly, for example the TCP/IP address of a client request! The problem is, for being able to announce a service in the network I need to grab the TCP address of a request to be able to redirect clients to that service. The broker is a central "service registry" in that case. However, having ZeroMQ services on both sides, I do not see an option to retrieve that information.
What I do now, is to establish a dummy connection using a standard socket to the broker, after the connection is established I grab the IP address used for this connection and close the connection again. The IP address which has been retrieved is now being used for binding on it using a ZeroMQ socket on a random port.
I think this solution is the ugliest solution ever possible, so: What is a better solution to this problem?
Greetings.
0MQ doesn't provide the address of peers, for a number of reasons. It's also not that useful since what you really want is the endpoint to receive connections on, not the address the connection was made on.
What I usually do, and it's elegant enough, is pass bind a service to an ephemeral port, get a full connection endpoint ("tcp://ipaddress:port") and send that string in some way, either broadcast to peers, to a central registry, etc. along with my service name. Then, peers who want to connect back can take the service name, look up to find my endpoint, and connect back to me.
In ZMQ 4.x, you may get the string property "Peer-Address" or the "Identity" property. http://api.zeromq.org/4-2:zmq-msg-gets
The Identity is set in the other peer before connect(). http://api.zeromq.org/4-2:zmq-setsockopt#toc20
For example,
const char *identityString = "identity";
zmq::context_t context(1);
zmq::socket_t socket(context, ZMQ_REQ);
socket.setsockopt(ZMQ_IDENTITY, identityString, strlen(identityString));
socket.connect("tcp://127.0.0.1:5555");
Then the other side:
while(1)
{
zmq::message_t request;
if (socket.recv(&request, ZMQ_NOBLOCK))
{
const char* identity = request.gets("Identity");
const char* peerAddress = request.gets("Peer-Address");
printf("Received from %s %s\n", peerAddress, identity);
break;
}
}
I'm using CppZmq btw, you should be able to find the relevant calls easily.
Digging deeper into the libzmq code, I discovered that the library attaches to every message instance the file descriptor that it was received on.
This worked for me
int sockfd = zmq_msg_get(&msg, ZMQ_SRCFD);
sockaddr_in addr;
socklen_t asize = sizeof(addr);
getpeername(sockfd, (sockaddr*)&addr, &asize);
std::cout << inet_ntoa(addr.sin_addr) << ":" << addr.sin_port << std::endl;
Note that the FDs can and will be reused by other connections.
I'm working with version 4.2.1 of the api using the CZMQ binding and I found a solution for my case (ZMQ_STREAM). It works by setting an id before connecting.
The relevant socket option is "ZMQ_CONNECT_RID".
ZMQ api via zmq_setsockopt()
CZMQ api via zsock_set_connect_rid()
Some codes with redacted redacted ips.
const char endpoint1[] = "tcp://1.2.3.4:12345"
const char endpoint2[] = "tcp://5.6.7.8:12345"
zsock_t *stream = zsock_new(ZMQ_STREAM);
zsock_set_connect_rid(stream, endpoint1);
zsock_connect(stream, endpoint1);
zsock_set_connect_rid(stream, endpoint2);
zsock_connect(stream, endpoint2);
Then I get those 2 messages if there is a connection. First frame is the id and second frame is empty on connect/disconnect for ZMQ_STREAM sockets.
[Message1]
[019] tcp://1.2.3.4:12345
[000]
[Message2]
[019] tcp://5.6.7.8:12345
[000]
Another option is to use the zmq_socket_monitor() or czmq zmonitor. It was one of my first solution but I was looking for something lighter. I was able the get the endpoint that way without setting the id directly on the socket.
The zmonitor zactor make it possible to subscribe to socket events and then it sends a message with 3 frames:
[009] CONNECTED
[002] 14
[021] tcp://127.0.0.1:33445

How does a socket know which network interface controller to use?

If a computer has multiple network cards, all of them connected to different networks and functioning properly, when we open a socket, how does the OS determine which NIC to use with this socket? Does the socket API allow us to explicitly specify the NIC that is to be used?
I'm writing this from a Linux perspective, but I suppose it applies everywhere.
The decision is made when the socket is bound. When bind is called, the address you specify determines the interface the socket will listen on. (Or even all interfaces.)
Even if you don't use bind, it happens implicitly when you connect. The destination is looked up in the route table, which must contain a route to the destination network. The route also contains the interface to use and can optionally even specify the source address. If no source address is specified, the primary address of the interface is taken.
You can actually use bind together with connect, to force your outgoing connection to use a specific address and port. A socket must always have these two bits of information, so even when you don't, the primary address is used and a random port are chosen.
I dont know why im included in the edit suggestion when i was not even related to this question .I got similar edit suggestion before as well..might be some bug/issue.
(If you feel inclined to up-vote, #Shtééf's answer deserves it more than mine.)
That depends on whether you are connecting or binding.
If you bind, you can bind to a specific IP address corresponding to one of the machine's interfaces, or you can bind to 0.0.0.0, in which case the socket will listen on all interfaces.
If you connect an unbound socket, then the machine's routing tables, in conjunction with the destination IP adress, will determine which interface the connection request goes out on.
It is possible to bind a socket then connect it. In this case, the socket will remain bound as per the bind call when it makes the connection. (Thanks to #RemyLebeau for pointing this out.)
I'm not really sure which method is the best, but there is an alternative theory to the bind()-before-connect() approach that Shtééf presented. It's to use setsockopt() with SO_BINDTODEVICE . See: http://codingrelic.geekhold.com/2009/10/code-snippet-sobindtodevice.html
As an alternative, you can search for the appropriate nic based on its name:
//Find the ip address based on the ethernet adapter name. On my machine the ethernet adapter is "Ethernet"
System.Net.NetworkInformation.NetworkInterface[] nics = System.Net.NetworkInformation.NetworkInterface.GetAllNetworkInterfaces();
System.Net.NetworkInformation.NetworkInterface ethernet = nics.Where(n => n.Name.Equals("Ethernet")).Single();
UnicastIPAddressInformation uniCastIPAddressInformation = ethernet.GetIPProperties().UnicastAddresses.Where(a => a.Address.AddressFamily == System.Net.Sockets.AddressFamily.InterNetwork).Single();
IPEndPoint localEndPoint = new IPEndPoint(uniCastIPAddressInformation.Address, 9000);
//Create a TCP/IP socket.
Socket listener = new Socket(AddressFamily.InterNetwork, SocketType.Stream, ProtocolType.Tcp);
//Bind and start listening
listener.Bind(localEndPoint);
listener.Listen(10);

How to bind to any available port?

I need an app that sends an UDP packet to some network server and receives the response. The server replies to the same port number where request came from, so I first need to bind() my socket to any UDP port number.
Hardcoding the UDP port number is a bad idea, as it might be used by any other application running on the same PC.
Is there a way to bind an UDP socket to any port available? IMO it should be an effective way to quickly obtain a free port #, which is used by e.g. accept() function.
If no, then what's the best strategy to try binding and check for WSAEADDRINUSE/EADDRINUSE status: try the ports sequentially starting from from 1025, or 1025+rand(), or some other?
Another option is to specify port 0 to bind(). That will allow you to bind to a specific IP address (in case you have multiple installed) while still binding to a random port. If you need to know which port was picked, you can use getsockname() after the binding has been performed.
Call sendto without calling bind first, the socket will be bound automatically (to a free port).
I must be missing something, why don't you use the udp socket to send back data?
Start with sendto and then use recvfrom function to read incoming data also you get as a bonus the address from which the data was sent, right there for you to send a response back.