Ubuntu Manpage: raw - Linux IPv4 raw sockets

NAME

       raw - Linux IPv4 raw sockets

SYNOPSIS

       #include <sys/socket.h>
       #include <netinet/in.h>
       raw_socket = socket(AF_INET, SOCK_RAW, int protocol);

DESCRIPTION

Raw sockets allow new IPv4 protocols to be implemented in user space. A raw socket
receives or sends the raw datagram not including link level headers.

The IPv4 layer generates an IP header when sending a packet unless the IP_HDRINCL socket
option is enabled on the socket. When it is enabled, the packet must contain an IP
header. For receiving, the IP header is always included in the packet.

Only processes with an effective user ID of 0 or the CAP_NET_RAW capability are allowed to
open raw sockets.

All packets or errors matching the protocol number specified for the raw socket are passed
to this socket. For a list of the allowed protocols, see the IANA list of assigned
protocol numbers at ⟨http://www.iana.org/assignments/protocol-numbers/⟩ and
getprotobyname(3).

A protocol of IPPROTO_RAW implies enabled IP_HDRINCL and is able to send any IP protocol
that is specified in the passed header. Receiving of all IP protocols via IPPROTO_RAW is
not possible using raw sockets.

┌───────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│IP Header fields modified on sending by IP_HDRINCL │
├──────────────────────┬────────────────────────────┤
│IP Checksum │ Always filled in │
├──────────────────────┼────────────────────────────┤
│Source Address │ Filled in when zero │
├──────────────────────┼────────────────────────────┤
│Packet ID │ Filled in when zero │
├──────────────────────┼────────────────────────────┤
│Total Length │ Always filled in │
└──────────────────────┴────────────────────────────┘

If IP_HDRINCL is specified and the IP header has a nonzero destination address, then the
destination address of the socket is used to route the packet. When MSG_DONTROUTE is
specified, the destination address should refer to a local interface, otherwise a routing
table lookup is done anyway but gatewayed routes are ignored.

If IP_HDRINCL isn't set, then IP header options can be set on raw sockets with
setsockopt(2); see ip(7) for more information.

Starting with Linux 2.2, all IP header fields and options can be set using IP socket
options. This means raw sockets are usually needed only for new protocols or protocols
with no user interface (like ICMP).

When a packet is received, it is passed to any raw sockets which have been bound to its
protocol before it is passed to other protocol handlers (e.g., kernel protocol modules).

Address format
For sending and receiving datagrams (sendto(2), recvfrom(2), and similar), raw sockets use
the standard sockaddr_in address structure defined in ip(7). The sin_port field could be
used to specify the IP protocol number, but it is ignored for sending in Linux 2.2 and
later, and should be always set to 0 (see BUGS). For incoming packets, sin_port is set to
zero.

Socket options
Raw socket options can be set with setsockopt(2) and read with getsockopt(2) by passing
the IPPROTO_RAW family flag.

ICMP_FILTER
Enable a special filter for raw sockets bound to the IPPROTO_ICMP protocol. The
value has a bit set for each ICMP message type which should be filtered out. The
default is to filter no ICMP messages.

In addition, all ip(7) IPPROTO_IP socket options valid for datagram sockets are supported.

Error handling
Errors originating from the network are passed to the user only when the socket is
connected or the IP_RECVERR flag is enabled. For connected sockets, only EMSGSIZE and
EPROTO are passed for compatibility. With IP_RECVERR, all network errors are saved in the
error queue.

ERRORS

       EACCES User  tried to send to a broadcast address without having the broadcast flag set on
              the socket.

       EFAULT An invalid memory address was supplied.

       EINVAL Invalid argument.

       EMSGSIZE
              Packet too big.  Either Path MTU Discovery is enabled (the  IP_MTU_DISCOVER  socket
              flag) or the packet size exceeds the maximum allowed IPv4 packet size of 64KB.

       EOPNOTSUPP
              Invalid flag has been passed to a socket call (like MSG_OOB).

       EPERM  The  user  doesn't  have  permission  to  open raw sockets.  Only processes with an
              effective user ID of 0 or the CAP_NET_RAW attribute may do that.

       EPROTO An ICMP error has arrived reporting a parameter problem.

VERSIONS

       IP_RECVERR and ICMP_FILTER are new in Linux 2.2.  They are Linux extensions and should not
       be used in portable programs.

       Linux  2.0  enabled some bug-to-bug compatibility with BSD in the raw socket code when the
       SO_BSDCOMPAT socket option was set; since Linux  2.2,  this  option  no  longer  has  that
       effect.

NOTES

By default, raw sockets do path MTU (Maximum Transmission Unit) discovery. This means the
kernel will keep track of the MTU to a specific target IP address and return EMSGSIZE when
a raw packet write exceeds it. When this happens, the application should decrease the
packet size. Path MTU discovery can be also turned off using the IP_MTU_DISCOVER socket
option or the /proc/sys/net/ipv4/ip_no_pmtu_disc file, see ip(7) for details. When turned
off, raw sockets will fragment outgoing packets that exceed the interface MTU. However,
disabling it is not recommended for performance and reliability reasons.

A raw socket can be bound to a specific local address using the bind(2) call. If it isn't
bound, all packets with the specified IP protocol are received. In addition, a raw socket
can be bound to a specific network device using SO_BINDTODEVICE; see socket(7).

An IPPROTO_RAW socket is send only. If you really want to receive all IP packets, use a
packet(7) socket with the ETH_P_IP protocol. Note that packet sockets don't reassemble IP
fragments, unlike raw sockets.

If you want to receive all ICMP packets for a datagram socket, it is often better to use
IP_RECVERR on that particular socket; see ip(7).

Raw sockets may tap all IP protocols in Linux, even protocols like ICMP or TCP which have
a protocol module in the kernel. In this case, the packets are passed to both the kernel
module and the raw socket(s). This should not be relied upon in portable programs, many
other BSD socket implementation have limitations here.

Linux never changes headers passed from the user (except for filling in some zeroed fields
as described for IP_HDRINCL). This differs from many other implementations of raw
sockets.

Raw sockets are generally rather unportable and should be avoided in programs intended to
be portable.

Sending on raw sockets should take the IP protocol from sin_port; this ability was lost in
Linux 2.2. The workaround is to use IP_HDRINCL.

BUGS

       Transparent proxy extensions are not described.

       When the IP_HDRINCL option is set, datagrams will not be fragmented and are limited to the
       interface MTU.

       Setting the IP protocol for sending in sin_port got lost in Linux 2.2.  The protocol  that
       the  socket  was  bound  to  or that was specified in the initial socket(2) call is always
       used.

COLOPHON

       This  page  is  part of release 4.04 of the Linux man-pages project.  A description of the
       project, information about reporting bugs, and the latest version of  this  page,  can  be
       found at http://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.