Wireshark-dev: Re: [Wireshark-dev] preference tree for SS7
From: Ulf Lamping <ulf.lamping@xxxxxx>
Date: Mon, 26 Mar 2007 18:28:12 +0200
> 
> Hi list,
> 
> I finally had a chance to look at the new feature from revision 21066:
> 
> http://anonsvn.wireshark.org/viewvc/viewvc.py?view=rev&revision=21066
> 
> and see what it looks like if I put, say, all the SS7 dissectors' 
> preferences in one preference tree called "SS7".  The result was a 
> little startling: I was able to put *21* dissectors' preferences in that 
> category:
> 
> ALCAP, ANSI BSMAP, ANSI MAP, BSSAP, BSSGP, CAMEL, GSM SMS UD, GSM_MAP, 
> INAP, ISUP, isup_thin, IUA, M2PA, M2UA, M3UA, MTP2, MTP3, SCCP, SUA, 
> TALI, TCAP
> 
> It looks good to me because I tend to think hierarchically and because I 
> don't like how long the current list of dissectors with preferences is 
> (too much scrolling before I find the one I want).
> 
> What does anyone else (especially signaling users) think?  Any objections?
> 

There are both reasons for and against it.

I'll agree that the current list is pretty long and I tend to like it to be hierarchical as well.

The drawback is: You'll have to know to search for protocol xy under SS7 (BTW: is this basically the same as http://wiki.wireshark.org/SIGTRAN ?). This might be obvious for frequent protocol user, but makes it probably more complicated for newbies (like me :-).

So if we want to group protocols, we should group (at least) most protocols, to have the protocol list length dastically reduced.

Maybe the current Protocol Family overview http://wiki.wireshark.org/ProtocolReference could work as a guideline to sort protocols into such groups.

Regards, ULFL

P.S: Some time ago, I've tried grouping some of the protocols in the menu structure, and immediately got objections from other developers against "my grouping" thoughts - so this discussion might become very controverse ;-)
P.P.S: Will the packet tree context "Protocol Preferences ..." still work with this? This feature is pretty useful!
_______________________________________________________________
SMS schreiben mit WEB.DE FreeMail - einfach, schnell und
kostenguenstig. Jetzt gleich testen! http://f.web.de/?mc=021192