Get 'ifconfig' information via Python

[M.-A. Lemburg]

David N. Welton wrote:
> 
> So, I think I'm getting close...
> 
> import fcntl
> import IN
> import struct
> 
> s = socket.socket(socket.AF_INET, socket.SOCK_STREAM)
> 
> res = fcntl.ioctl(s, IN.SIOCSIFHWADDR, ??????)
> 
> I can't seem to find what goes in ?????.
> 
> Is this the right way to be doing things?  I suppose I can always go
> pull apart the sources for ifconfig itself, and make a .so that does
> what I need, but I get the feeling that I can do what I need from
> within Python.
> 
> Yeah, I could popen ifconfig, too, but that's ugly.
> 
> Downloading python sources now to see what I can see in the fcntl
> module...

The .ioctl() function can take a string or an integer as 
third argument. To find out what to pass for a given option,
look at man ioctl and man ioctl_list. The exact meaning is
not mentioned there unfortunately, though.

On Linux, just dig into the net/core/dev.c file to find out
what happens for the above option:

The argument is being interpreted as struct ifreq and then copied 
to ifr...

                case SIOCGIFHWADDR:
                        memcpy(ifr.ifr_hwaddr.sa_data,dev->dev_addr, MAX_ADDR_LE
                        ifr.ifr_hwaddr.sa_family=dev->type;                     
                        goto rarok;
                                
                case SIOCSIFHWADDR:
                        if(dev->set_mac_address==NULL)
                                return -EOPNOTSUPP;
                        if(securelevel > 0)
                                return -EPERM;
                        if(ifr.ifr_hwaddr.sa_family!=dev->type)
                                return -EINVAL;
                        ret=dev->set_mac_address(dev,&ifr.ifr_hwaddr);
                        break;

The basic ifreq struct is defined in include/linux/if.h:

/*
 * Interface request structure used for socket
 * ioctl's.  All interface ioctl's must have parameter
 * definitions which begin with ifr_name.  The
 * remainder may be interface specific.
 */

struct ifreq 
{
#define IFHWADDRLEN     6
#define IFNAMSIZ        16
        union
        {
                char    ifrn_name[IFNAMSIZ];            /* if name, e.g. "en0" *
        } ifr_ifrn;
        
        union {
                struct  sockaddr ifru_addr;
                struct  sockaddr ifru_dstaddr;
                struct  sockaddr ifru_broadaddr;
                struct  sockaddr ifru_netmask;
                struct  sockaddr ifru_hwaddr;
                short   ifru_flags;
                int     ifru_metric;
                int     ifru_mtu;
                struct  ifmap ifru_map;
                char    ifru_slave[IFNAMSIZ];   /* Just fits the size */
                caddr_t ifru_data;
        } ifr_ifru;
};

#define ifr_name        ifr_ifrn.ifrn_name      /* interface name       */
#define ifr_hwaddr      ifr_ifru.ifru_hwaddr    /* MAC address          */
#define ifr_addr        ifr_ifru.ifru_addr      /* address              */
#define ifr_dstaddr     ifr_ifru.ifru_dstaddr   /* other end of p-p lnk */
#define ifr_broadaddr   ifr_ifru.ifru_broadaddr /* broadcast address    */
#define ifr_netmask     ifr_ifru.ifru_netmask   /* interface net mask   */
#define ifr_flags       ifr_ifru.ifru_flags     /* flags                */
#define ifr_metric      ifr_ifru.ifru_metric    /* metric               */
#define ifr_mtu         ifr_ifru.ifru_mtu       /* mtu                  */
#define ifr_map         ifr_ifru.ifru_map       /* device map           */
#define ifr_slave       ifr_ifru.ifru_slave     /* slave device         */
#define ifr_data        ifr_ifru.ifru_data      /* for use by interface */

Building these structs can be done using the Python struct
module... playing around with this can probably crash your system
though.

In the end, I think you're better off hacking together a
new extension module.

Hope that helps.

-- 
Marc-Andre Lemburg
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