Introduction

aioarp

---

Table of Contents

• Installation
• ARP request
• ARP response

Installation

pip install aioarp

How to send ARP requests

import aioarp
response = aioarp.request('10.0.2.2', 'enp0s3')
print(response.sender_mac)
ee:xx:aa:mm:pp:le  # mac address

import trio
import aioarp
response = trio.run(aioarp.arequest, '10.0.2.2', 'enp0s3')

import asyncio
import aioarp
response = asyncio.run(aioarp.arequest('10.0.2.2', 'enp0s3'))

This is the packet that was sent over the network.

Ethernet II, Src: PcsCompu (YOUR MAC), Dst: Broadcast (ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff)
    Destination: Broadcast (ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff)
    Source: PcsCompu (YOUR MAC)
    Type: ARP (0x0806)
Address Resolution Protocol (request)
    Hardware type: Ethernet (1)
    Protocol type: IPv4 (0x0800)
    Hardware size: 6
    Protocol size: 4
    Opcode: request (1)
    Sender MAC address: PcsCompu (YOUR MAC)
    Sender IP address: 10.0.2.15
    Target MAC address: Broadcast (ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff)
    Target IP address: 10.0.2.2

If you want, you can explicitly set all of the ARP headers. To do so, create the ArpPacket instance yourself and then ask aioarp to send that request.

import aioarp

arp_packet = aioarp.ArpPacket(
    hardware_type=aioarp.HardwareType.ethernet,
    protocol_type=aioarp.Protocol.ip,
    sender_mac='11:11:11:11:11:11',
    sender_ip='127.0.0.1',
    target_mac='11:11:11:11:11:11',
    target_ip='127.0.0.1')

response = aioarp.sync_send_arp(arp_packet)

This sends the same ARP request as your ArpPacket instance.

Note

The Hardware Size and Protocol Size headers are automatically set depending on the hardware type and protocol used.

Address Resolution Protocol (request/gratuitous ARP)
    Hardware type: Ethernet (1)
    Protocol type: IPv4 (0x0800)
    Hardware size: 6
    Protocol size: 4
    Opcode: request (1)
    [Is gratuitous: True]
    Sender MAC address: Private_11:11:11 (11:11:11:11:11:11)
    Sender IP address: 127.0.0.1
    Target MAC address: Private_11:11:11 (11:11:11:11:11:11)
    Target IP address: 127.0.0.1

As you can see, the packet that was sent over the network was identical to the packet that we created; you can pass whatever you want and build your own arp packet.

ARP response

Let's try again with another arp request and see what we can do with the respone object.

import aioarp
response = aioarp.request('10.0.2.2', 'enp0s3')
# The `sender_mac` header for arp responses, as we know, 
# indicates the actual answer to our question "Who has 10.0.2.2?" 
# That is the protocol implementation; 
# the other computer that responds should 
# set the sender_mac to the computer's mac address that we are looking for.
print(response.sender_mac)
# ee:xx:aa:mm:pp:le  # mac address of 10.0.2.2

Other headers such as hardware_type, protocol_type, and operation can also be seen.

response.opcode  # operation header
# Opcode.response  # This indicates that this is an arp response rather than a request.
response.protocol_length
# 4  This indicates that 4 bytes were used for the sender and target ips because we used ipv4, which is actually 4 bytes.

Each one has a distinct meaning, which can be found in wikipedia.

Failed Responses

If the response is not received, aioarp should throw a aioarp.NotFoundError exception.

This occurs when the default arp request timeout expires. The timeout is set to 5 by default, but it can be changed by passing the timeout argument to the request function.

response = aioarp.request('10.0.2.25', 'enp0s3')

response = aioarp.request('10.0.2.25', 'enp0s3', timeout=0.5)