• Introduction
• Loading and Saving Rule Sets
• Sample Coloring Rules
• Temporary Coloring Rules

Introduction

This page contains a set of sample coloring rules that people have shared with the Wireshark community. You can learn more about coloring rules and packet colorization in the User's Guide.

As both coloring rules and display filters share the same syntax, you might have a look at the DisplayFilters page.

The coloring rules were previously called color filters and a file named colorfilters is still used to store them, as a result you will often see both terms used the same way.

Loading and Saving Rule Sets

To use one of the coloring rules files listed here, download it to your local machine, select View→Coloring Rules in Wireshark, and click the Import… button.

If you'd like to add an entry to this page you can export a rule set by clicking on the Export… button in the Coloring Rules dialog. (It helps if you save the file with a ".txt" extension.) To upload the exported file, drag and drop the file in the edit pane. If you wish to include a screen shot, please create a separate page for your filter and put the screen shot and filter on that page.

Sample Coloring Rules

Page: TCP_Retransmissions_ColorFilter
Contributor: Ronnie Sahlberg

File: Sample_color_filter.txt
Description: Sample color filter file.
Contributor: Gerald Combs

Page: General_use_ColorFilter
File: Another_Color_Filter
Description: More Protocols color filtered for general use.
Contributor: John Prudente

File: Yet_Another_Color_Filter3.txt
Description: Another general purpose filter. Includes highlighting of home style routers (D-Link, Netgear & Linksys); AppleTalk & IPX/SPX protocols; OSPF, STP & HRSP events. Useful for the corporate LAN. **Modified after stealing ideas from some of the other submissions.
Contributor: Peter Bruno

Page: Jay's_Coloring_Rules
Updated: 7/17/06
Description: General use coloring rules. Easy on the eyes colors.
Contributor: JayMoran

File: Arv_Coloring_Rules.txt
Description: Example emphasized on detecting errors and coloring client/server. It doesn't highlight particular protocols (as I usually filter interesting one). Edit Your MAC address before import ('from my PC' and 'to my PC' rules)
Thanks to Peter Bruno for some rules.
Contributor: Arv

File: iscsicolor.txt
Description: Highlights SCSI check conditions in red and highlights iSCSI packets with no associated commands or no associated responses in purple. Note: logins and logouts do not have responses so they are also purple.
Contributor: proggoddess

File: DCE_RPC_Coloring_Rules.txt
Description: Coloring of DCE/RPC and related protocols and grouping various windows network based protocols.
Contributor: UlfLamping

• File: Wireless_Wiresharkcolor_Pedrick
  Description: Coloring of Wireless Authentication Packets for 802.11, WPA, and 11i protocols. Supports Preauth as well.
  Contributor: perccapt

• File: Wireshark-Wlan-ColouringRules
  Description: Coloring of Wireless Lan Packets for 802.11, WPA, 11i and EAP protocols.
  Contributor: muteX

Temporary Coloring Rules

The colors for the temporary rules can be modified on Wireshark startup. From the WSDG:

The color list can be set from the command line using two unofficial preferences: gui.colorized_frame.bg and gui.colorized_frame.fg, which require 10 hex RGB codes (6 hex digits each), e.g.

wireshark -o gui.colorized_frame.bg:${RGB0},${RGB1},${RGB2},${RGB3},${RGB4},${RGB5},${RGB6},${RGB7},${RGB8},${RGB9}

For example, this command yields the same results as the table above (and with all foregrounds set to black):

wireshark \
-o gui.colorized_frame.bg:ffc0c0,ffc0ff,e0c0e0,c0c0ff,c0e0e0,c0ffff,c0ffc0,ffffc0,e0e0c0,e0e0e0 \
-o gui.colorized_frame.fg:000000,000000,000000,000000,000000,000000,000000,000000,,000000,000000

Lua functions are available to query (get_color_filter_slot(row)) and set (set_color_filter_slot(row, text)) the temporary coloring rules.

Table 11.1. Default background colors

frame.coloring_rule.name will be ___conversation_color_filter___"rule number".

Frame 1: 82 bytes on wire (656 bits), 82 bytes captured (656 bits)
    Encapsulation type: Ethernet (1)
    Arrival Time: May 13, 2022 16:58:14.080398000 Central Daylight Time
    [Protocols in frame: eth:ethertype:ip:ospf]
    [Coloring Rule Name: ___conversation_color_filter___01]
    [Coloring Rule String: eth.addr eq xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx and eth.xxdr eq xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx

Imported from https://wiki.wireshark.org/ColoringRules on 2020-08-11 23:12:18 UTC