2011-10-13:

The overdue NetSock release

netsock
NetSock is a simple socket/networking lib/wrapper for C++ I've wrote back in 2007 (or 2006, actually not sure) and update from time to time. Even though I've been using it in random projects I'm releasing from time to time, I've never officially released it as a standalone project - an oversight I'm now going to correct.

Update: Changed to version 2011.10.13 due to a bug in previous version in the WriteAll function (thx to . at the PL side of this blog for pointing it out).

Download: NetSock-2011.10.13.zip (5kb, src C++)
License : Apache License, Version 2.0 (open source)

I'm using this library both on Windows and on GNU/Linux. Maybe it will (can) work also on other similar systems (*nix family, etc) - not sure, I haven't checked.

Features:
- basic support for TCP (Connect, Listen, ListenAll, Accept, Read, Write, WriteAll, etc)
- basic support for UDP (WriteUDP, BroadcastUDP, ReadUDP, etc)
- basic support for asynchronous/non-blocking sockets (SetMode, WriteAll)
- InitNetworking does WinSock initialization for you
- host name resolving support in Connect/etc

However, NetSock is not fit for projects that need to use the network in a more advance way (like setting up other socket options, using different socket protocols like IrDA, etc).

Also, I didn't plan to create an universal library; on the contrary, the features were added rather organically (i.e. if I needed certain feature, I've added it to the lib), so some things might be missing, other might be slightly irritating (like using "unsigned char *" in Write/Read arguments; this will be fixed in the unspecified future).

Nevertheless, I hope someone will find it useful (e.g. for small tools or prototyping).

An example of usage:
// Windows  : g++ test.cpp NetSock.cpp -lws2_32
// GNU/Linux: g++ test.cpp
#include <stdio.h>
#include "NetSock.h"

int main() {
 NetSock::InitNetworking(); // Initialize WinSock
 
 NetSock s;
 int ret;
 unsigned char buffer[8] = {0};
 
 if (!s.Connect("127.0.0.1", 1333))
   return 1; // Some error handling.
 
 // Write some ASCII string.
 ret = s.Write((unsigned char*)"asdf", 4);
 if (ret != 4)
   return 2; // Some error handling.

 // Read some ASCII string.
 ret = s.Read(buffer, sizeof(buffer) - 1);
 if (ret <= 0)
   return 3; // Some error handling.

 // Write out the string.
 puts((char*)buffer);  
 
 s.Disconnect();
 
 return 0;
}

And that's that.

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