tcpaccept(8)

NAME
tcpaccept - Trace TCP passive connections (accept()). Uses Linux eBPF/bcc.

SYNOPSIS
tcpaccept [-h] [-T] [-t] [-p PID] [-P PORTS]

DESCRIPTION
This tool traces passive TCP connections (eg, via an accept() syscall; connect() are active connections). This can be useful for general troubleshooting to see what new connections the local server is accepting. This uses dynamic tracing of the kernel inet_csk_accept() socket function (from tcp_prot.accept), and will need to be modified to match kernel changes. This tool only traces successful TCP accept()s. Connection attempts to closed ports will not be shown (those can be traced via other functions). Since this uses BPF, only the root user can use this tool.

REQUIREMENTS
CONFIG_BPF and bcc.

OPTIONS

-h  Print usage message.

-T  Include a time column on output (HH:MM:SS).

-t  Include a timestamp column.

-p PID
    Trace this process ID only (filtered in-kernel).

-P PORTS
    Comma-separated list of local ports to trace (filtered in-kernel).

EXAMPLES

Trace all passive TCP connections (accept()s):
    # tcpaccept

Trace all TCP accepts, and include timestamps:
    # tcpaccept -t

Trace connections to local ports 80 and 81 only:
    # tcpaccept -P 80,81

Trace PID 181 only:
    # tcpaccept -p 181

FIELDS

TIME
    Time of the event, in HH:MM:SS format.

TIME(s)
    Time of the event, in seconds.

PID Process ID

COMM
    Process name

IP  IP address family (4 or 6)

RADDR
    Remote IP address.

RPORT
    Remote port

LADDR
    Local IP address.

LPORT
    Local port

OVERHEAD
This traces the kernel inet_csk_accept function and prints output for each event. The rate of this depends on your server application. If it is a web or proxy server accepting many tens of thousands of connections per second, then the overhead of this tool may be measurable (although, still a lot better than tracing every packet). If it is less than a thousand a second, then the overhead is expected to be negligible. Test and understand this overhead before use.

SOURCE
This is from bcc.

    https://github.com/iovisor/bcc

Also look in the bcc distribution for a companion _examples.txt file containing example usage, output, and commentary for this tool.

OS
Linux

STABILITY
Unstable - in development.

AUTHOR
Brendan Gregg

SEE ALSO
tcpconnect(8), funccount(8), tcpdump(8)