When you launch Wireshark for the first time, you might find it hard to navigate around the interface until you are familiar with all of the elements required to begin capturing and analyzing traffic. In this chapter, we will step through the Wireshark interface. You will come to understand all of the elements of the welcome page, the sparklines, capture filters, and select interfaces.

Although Wireshark currently has over ten menu choices, in most cases, you'll find that there are a few that are more commonly accessed. We'll take a look at those so that you are more confident when moving about the interface. We'll examine the File menu, where you will not only open a packet capture, but can also save, print, and export the capture. We will also investigate the Edit menu where you can mark packets, set time references, and add comments. Finally, we'll take a look at the View menu so you can learn how to customize the look and feel of the Wireshark interface.

This chapter will address all of this by covering the following:

• Understanding the welcome screen
• Exploring the File menu options
• Discover the Edit menu options
• Grasping the View menu options