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Logging settings

SoftPerfect Traffic Meter can save captured packets in log files. UDP and TCP packets are saved to different files, while TCP packets are joined together into sessions. Please note that only packets passed through filters are logged.

The format of the log file for UDP packets is: Date-Time, sender and receiver addresses, sender and receiver ports, and packet size. Below is an example of the log:

24.06.2003 12:18:01 192.168.10.253 192.168.10.78 53 1282 120
24.06.2003 12:18:03 192.168.10.78 192.168.8.128 137 137 104
24.06.2003 12:18:21 192.168.10.78 192.168.10.253 1289 53 77
24.06.2003 12:18:21 192.168.10.253 192.168.10.78 53 1289 121

TCP logging is somewhat different because the program organizes the separate packets into sessions. For example, when a user is downloading a file from the Internet, thousands of packets are exchanged, which are joined together into one session. After the file is downloaded the session is logged. You can also specify a minimum session length to avoid logging small exchanges.

The TCP log file contains: date-time, client address, server address, client port, server port, and session length. Here is an example of the TCP log:

10.05.2004 21:38:36 10.0.0.1 194.186.36.134 1839 80 1340
10.05.2004 21:38:36 10.0.0.1 194.186.36.134 1840 80 16086
10.05.2004 21:38:36 10.0.0.1 213.180.216.251 1841 80 1129
10.05.2004 21:38:41 10.0.0.1 62.118.249.18 1829 80 671
10.05.2004 21:38:41 10.0.0.1 62.118.249.18 1828 80 48454

There is one additional option Minimum Session Length. This is the minimum session length to be logged. It is not recommended to set it too small, as your log file size will grow too rapidly.