RAW(4)              Linux Programmer's Manual              RAW(4)

NAME
       raw, SOCK_RAW - Linux IPv4 RAW sockets

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

DESCRIPTION
       RAW  sockets  allow the user to implement own protocols on
       top of IPv4.  All packets or errors matching the  protocol
       specified  for  the  raw socket are passed to this socket.
       For a list of the allowed protocols see  RFC1700  assigned
       numbers  and  getprotobyname(3).   protocol  is in network
       order. If  the  protocol  is  IPPROTO_RAW  the  IP_HDRINCL
       option  is  enabled  on  the  socket  and  only sending is
       allowed.

       Only processes  with  the  effective  user  id  0  or  the
       CAP_NET_RAW attribute set are allowed to open raw sockets.

       The data passed by the user is appended to  an  IP  header
       (unless  the  IP_HDRINCL flag is set, then the user has to
       pass his own IP header) and sent to the specified destina-
       tion  address.  Raw  sockets  use the standard sockaddr_in
       address structure defined in ip(4).   The  sin_port  field
       can  be used to specify the protocol number, otherwise the
       protocol specified in the initial socket(2) call is  used.
       For  incoming  packets  sin_port is set to the protocol of
       the packet.

       When the IP_HDRINCL socket option is enabled on  a  socket
       no IP header is generated on sending.  The user shall pass
       its own IP header in front of the packet.

       +------------------------------------------------------------------+
       |IP Header fields modified on sending when IP_HDRINCL is specified |
       +------------------------------------------------------------------+
       |  Sending fragments with IP_HDRINCL is not supported currently.   |
       +--------------------------+---------------------------------------+
       |IP Checksum               |Always filled in.                      |
       +--------------------------+---------------------------------------+
       |Source Address            |Filled in when zero.                   |
       +--------------------------+---------------------------------------+
       |Packet Id                 |Filled in when passed as 0.            |
       +--------------------------+---------------------------------------+
       |Total Length              |Always filled in.                      |
       +--------------------------+---------------------------------------+

       If IP_HDRINCL is specified and the IP header has a  desti-
       nation address unequal zero the destination address of the
       socket is used to route the packet. When MSG_DONTROUTE  is
       specified  the  destination  address must refer to a local
       interface, otherwise a routing table lookup is done.

       Other IP header options can be set with the usual  way  of
       using the standard ip control messages like IP_TTL for the
       time-to-live field, IP_TOS for the tos  field,  IP_PKTINFO
       for the interface and IP_OPTIONS for ip options. See ip(4)
       for more information. When IP_HDRINCL is set these options
       are illegal.

       In  Linux 2.2 all IP header fields and options can be sent
       and received using IP control  messages.  This  means  raw
       sockets  are  only  needed  for new protocols or protocols
       with no user interface (like ICMP). Generation  of  custom
       TCP  or  UDP  packets  using raw sockets is unnecessary in
       many cases.

       When a packet is received Linux  first  checks  if  a  raw
       socket  has  been  bound to the protocol of the packet. If
       this is true  the  packet  is  first  passed  to  the  raw
       socket(s)  and then passed to other receivers of this pro-
       tocol (e.g. kernel protocol modules).

SOCKET OPTIONS
       Raw socket options can be set  with  getsockopt  and  read
       with getsockopt by passing the SOL_RAW family flag.

       ICMP_FILTER  Enable a special filter for raw sockets bound
       to the IPPROTO_ICMP protocol. The passed value  long  word
       mask with the bits representing the ICMP types. All incom-
       ing ICMP messages with a type equal to a bit number set in
       this  mask  are not passed to the socket. This can be used
       to filter out uninteresting ICMP messages. The default  is
       to pass all ICMP messages.

       Additionally  raw  sockets support all ip(4) SOL_IP socket
       flags. One SOL_IP socket flag specific to raw  sockets  is
       the  IP_HDRINCL  flag.  When this flag is enabled the user
       has to pass his own IP header.  Linux does not change this
       IP header in any way.

NOTES
       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  BSD sockets
       implementations.

       Raw sockets  fragment  a  packet  when  its  total  length
       exceeds the interface MTU.  A better more network friendly
       alternative  is  to  use  path  MTU  discovery.   If   the
       IP_PMTU_DISCOVER option is enabled the network stack auto-
       matically saves the MTU of targets that have been  sucess-
       fully  communicated  with  in the routing cache. When Path
       MTU is in progress packets may be dropped when the initial
       MTU guess was too large. The application has to do its own
       retransmit strategy  to  handle  this  situation  (but  of
       course  packets  may  be  always dropped for other reasons
       too, so this has be handled anyways).  When the socket  is
       connected  to a specific peer with connect(2) the path mtu
       can be retrieved  conveniently  using  the  IP_MTU  socket
       option after a EMSGSIZE error occurred. For connectionless
       sockets with many destinations the new MTU can be accessed
       using  the  error  queue  (see  IP_RECVERR in ip(4)).  The
       application should lower its packet sizes then.  To get an
       initial  PMTU  estimate it is possible to connect a tempo-
       rary socket to the destination and retrieve the  currently
       known PMTU using the IP_MTU getsockopt.

ERROR HANDLING
       Errors  originated from the network are only passed to the
       user 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  errors
       are saved in the error queue.

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

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

       EPROTO  An  ICMP  error  telling about a parameter problem
               has arrived.

       EFAULT  User has supplied invalid user memory address.

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

       EINVAL  Invalid argument.

       EPERM   The user doesn't have permission to open raw sock-
               ets. Only processes with a effective user id of  0
               or the CAP_NET_RAW attribute may do that.

VERSIONS
       IP_RECVERR  and ICMP_FILTER are new in Linux 2.2. They are
       Linux extensions and should not be used in  portable  pro-
       grams.

       Linux  2.0  enabled some bug-to-bug compatibility with BSD
       in the raw socket code when the SO_BSDCOMPAT flag was  set
       - that has been removed in 2.2.

BUGS
       Transparent proxy extensions are not described.

NOTES
       Linux doesn't allow reception of all packets regardless of
       the protocol when IPPROTO_RAW is specified.  These sockets
       are send only.  If you really want to receive all IP pack-
       ets use a packet(4) socket  with  the  ETH_P_IP  protocol.
       Note  that  packet  sockets don't reassemble IP fragments,
       unlike raw sockets.

       When the IP_HDRINCL option is set packets  are  not  frag-
       mented on sending. This is a limitation in Linux 2.2.

       If you want to receive all ICMP packets for a socket it is
       better to use IP_RECVERR on that particular  socket  (only
       works for datagram oriented sockets).

       In  Linux RAW sockets may tap all single packet protocols,
       even protocols like ICMP 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   is
       unportable, many other stacks have limitations here.

       Linux  does not mangles outgoing RAW socket headers except
       for the cases documented above. Some other stacks do  more
       changes  (like  changing  byte  order  in  some  IP header
       fields).

SEE ALSO
       ip(4), socket(4), recvmsg(2), sendmsg(2)

       RFC1191 for path MTU discovery.

Linux Man Page              2 Oct 1998                          1