Show HN: A toy version of Wireshark (student project)

Hi everyone,

I recently published a small open-source project. It’s a minimal network packet analyzer written in Go — designed more like a learning toy than a replacement for Wireshark.

It currently supports parsing basic protocols like TLS, DNS, and HTTP, and includes a tiny fuzzing engine to test payload responses. You can inspect raw packet content directly from the terminal. The output is colored for readability, and the code structure is kept simple and clear.

The entire program is very small — just about 400 lines of Go code. I know it’s not anywhere near Wireshark’s level, and I still use Wireshark myself for real-world analysis. But I built it as a personal experiment in network parsing and to understand protocol behavior more directly.

If you're curious or would like to try it out, the project is here: https://github.com/lixiasky/vanta

I'm happy to hear your thoughts, suggestions, or critiques. It’s just a little network toy, but maybe someone out there finds it useful or fun.

Thanks for reading!

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44159758

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https://github.com/lixiasky/vanta