Myricom Sniffer10G

The Myricom Sniffer10G software uses Myri-10G programmable Network Interface Cards (NICs), a firmware extension, and a user-level library to enable sustained capture of 10-Gigabit Ethernet traffic. Small-packet coalescing and an efficient zero-copy path to host memory allow Sniffer10G to capture streams at line rate (14.88 Mpps) for all Ethernet packet sizes. Optionally, Sniffer10G can enable multiple independent processes or threads to concurrently analyze the incoming traffic from one or more NIC ports.

The Sniffer10G software distribution is controlled by a dual-mode driver that operates as a regular 10G Ethernet driver until the device is enabled for packet capture. For packet capture, the library and driver instruct the firmware to divert incoming packets to library-managed user-level receive rings instead of the regular Ethernet driver. All the while, the Ethernet driver remains available to send raw Ethernet packets.

Sniffer10G's packet capture capabilities can be leveraged through the popular Libpcap library or directly through the SNF API, available as a set of C programming language functions. Using an SNF-aware Libpcap, users reference a Myri-10G NIC through its Ethernet interface name and can run existing Libpcap-dependent applications and continue to rely on Libpcap's portable interface. For more advanced usage, the SNF API can be targeted directly. In both cases, going through the SNF interface instead of the kernel ensures a tighter level of integration with the Myri-10G NIC by leveraging user-level receive mechanisms.

Sniffer10G can only be purchased in conjunction with Myricom 10 Gbit/s Ethernet NICs, please see related products for further information.