Netkitty is a small network tool that complements Netcat. In this brief tutorial we will show how to use the NetKitty features not avaliable on Netcat. You can get precompiled versions for multiple platforms in our Tools Page or get the source code from Savannah Server.

Basic Usage

The basic usage of NetKitty is really simple. The command syntax is as follows:

nk [-hub] [-shell] [-os] [-client (([T|U|B|S]),(ip|bt|serial), (port|baud))*] [-server ((T|U|B),port)*]

where:

• hub: Activates the hub mode (see below).
• shell: Activates the shell mode (see below).
• os: Terminates application when all the clients disconnect.
• client: Configures nk to connect to a remote system.
• server: Configures nk to accept connections from remote systems.

Specific parameters for clients and servers are specified below:

• Type of communication
• T : Uses TCP for connect/accept communications
• U : Uses UDP for connect/accept communications
• B : Uses Bluetooth rfcom for connect/accept communications
• S : Uses Serial Port to interchange information
• ip|bt|serial. Will take the form of an IP address (x.x.x.x), a Bluetooth address (XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX) if B was specified, where x represents decimal numbers and XX hexadecimal ones, or a GNU/Linux Serial port (/dev/ttyXX)
• port|baud. This is the TCP, UDP communication port, the Bluetooth channel is the B option was used or the serial port speed in bauds.

In the rest of this text some examples on how to use nk are show.

Instant Messaging. The -hub flag

The -hub flag converts NetKitty in a simple Instant Messaging system. This flag makes nk to resend anything it gets from any link to any other link it is managing.

Let's see how to use it to set up a simple Instant Messaging System with nk.

• Choose a machine as server and execute the following command:

  nk -hub -server T,10000
  

• Now, anyone how wants to chat on-line simply runs:

  nk -client T,remote_ip,10000
  

  Remember to substitute "remote_ip" for the IP address of the machine running the server side.

You can connect as many clients as you want to your new IM server.

Poor's Man Telnet

The -shell flags instructs NetKitty to start an interactive shell (/bin/sh -i), whenever a connection is established. In order to use this feature almost one server port should be defined.

A simple example, providing shell access to a given device either using a normal TCP connection or a bluetooth link:

nk -shell -server T,5000 B,5

From this point on, any connection to TCP port 5000 or any Bluetooth connection through channel 5, will provide a rudimentary shell to any client.

The -shell flag actually accepts a parameter. A program to run. This is handy for instance to run a shell on an Android device. For that scenario, use the following command instead:

nk -shell /system/bin/sh -server T,5000 B,5

This flag will actually connect the stdin, stdout and stderr of the run process to the associated network connection.

Multi-Hop Shell

It is possible to chain multiple machines to get shell access to a destination box. The commands required are shown below.

In the destination machine a server with shell access is executed in hub mode. ,p/>

nk -hub -shell -s T,5002

In the intermediate machines a proxy configuration is used:

nk -s -hub  T,5001 -c T,127.0.0.1,5002

Then on the source machine a normal TCP client is executed against the first machine in the chain:

nk -c T,127.0.0.1,5001

NOTE: The ports in the examples above are just examples. Any port can be used.

Network Distributor

You can use NetKitty to distribute a data source to several remote clients in an easy way. We had used this features several times to make a simple one-way client connecting to different servers and sending the same data to each one... without modifying neither the client nor the server.

In order to illustrate our example, a real live example will be taken. Suppose that we have a visual tracking system that send positional information to a simulation engine trough a TCP/IP channel. The simulation engine TCP port will be 10000.

Now, we want to control two different simulation engines from the same optical tracking system, so we use nk for this task. In the machine running the optical tracking system we launch nk with this line:

nk -hub -server T,10000 -client T,ip_server1,10000 T,ip_server2,10000

Now we only need to configure our tracking system to send data to a "virtual" simulation engine running in localhost (127.0.0.1:10000).

Simple backup

NetKitty allows to perform backups in the same way that netcat. As NetKitty allows the server to accept further connections, the -os flags should be used to instruct the server side to finish when the client disconnects.

So, in order to perform a backup, The following commands should be used.

In the machine where the backup will be stored run:

nk -os -server -T,10000 > raw_data.dat

In the machine you want to backup run:

cat whatever | nk -client T,the_ip,10000

That's all.

Bluetooth Connections

NetKitty supports rfcomm bluetooth connection, providing an additional mechanism to connect different devices. We can seamless mix network and bluetooth devices in our communications using nk.

This example show how to use nk to gather information from different sensor devices. Some of then are equipped with wifi devices, so they can be managed as normal TCP connections, but other uses bluetooth to transmit the date collected. So, this nk command-line will do the job.

nk -server -T,10000 -B,4 > raw_data.dat

With the line above, NetKitty will accept TCP connections to port 10000, and rfcomm bluetooth connection on channel 4.

If you don't want to code all the bluetooth socket stuff in your sensor systems applications, just let nk transmit your data out. Let's suppose that your data application dumps data to stdout and that our server is in Bluetooth address 30:F2:61:CE:B2:A3. Then this line will be useful:

data-app | nk -client B,30:F2:61:CE:B2:A3,4

Accessing Serial Ports

NetKitty also supports access to serial ports in order to easily interface with other devices. Using this functionality together with the -hub flag enables remote access to serial ports.

In order to send and receive data from a serial port (e.g. /dev/ttyO4) configured to work at 9600 bauds, the following command can be used:

nk  -c S,/dev/ttyO4,9600

Remote network access can be achieved with the following command-line:

nk  -hub -s T,5000 -c S,/dev/ttyO4,9600

NOTE: NetKitty uses a 8:N:1 standard configuration for the serial port. That is the most common configuration and in order to keep nk small no option had been provided to support other configurations.
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