2. Who should read this document?

The intended audience of this book is anyone using Wireshark.

This book will explain all the basics and also some of the advanced features that Wireshark provides. As Wireshark has become a very complex program since the early days, not every feature of Wireshark may be explained in this book.

This book is not intended to explain network sniffing in general and it will not provide details about specific network protocols. A lot of useful information regarding these topics can be found at the Wireshark Wiki at http://wiki.wireshark.org

By reading this book, you will learn how to install Wireshark, how to use the basic elements of the graphical user interface (such as the menu) and what's behind some of the advanced features that are not always obvious at first sight. It will hopefully guide you around some common problems that frequently appear for new (and sometimes even advanced) users of Wireshark.