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LA Network Interface Helper Library

Copyright (C) 2016-2026, L-Acoustics

What is LA_networkInterfaceHelper

LA_networkInterfaceHelper is a lightweight open source library for enumerating Network Interfaces and monitoring any state change.

This library are written in pure C++17. It can be compiled on Windows, Linux and macOS, using standard development tools (procedure below). The library can target the following platforms: Windows, Linux, macOS and iOS.

Unit tests and sample programs are also provided, and a SWIG interface file is proposed for easy integration with other languages.

We use GitHub issues for tracking requests and bugs.

Licensing

This software is licensed under the BSD 3-clause License (see LICENSE).

Minimum requirements for compilation

All platforms

  • CMake 3.22

Windows

  • Windows 10
  • Visual Studio 2022 v17.14 or greater
  • GitBash, cygwin or WSL

macOS

  • macOS 11
  • Xcode 26

Linux

  • C++17 compliant compiler (minimum recommended g++ 11.2.0)
  • Make

Platform notes

macOS 27 and later

Starting with macOS 27, the kernel redacts the link-layer (MAC) address of all network interfaces for non-root processes: getifaddrs, sysctl and ioctl all return 02:00:00:00:00:00 (the same privacy hardening that exists on iOS). This is a deliberate change by Apple, not a bug. The library transparently falls back to the SystemConfiguration framework (the same source used by the networksetup command line tool) to retrieve the hardware address of physical interfaces, so no change is required in applications using this library.

Virtual interfaces that are not backed by a hardware controller (eg. bridge0) do not have a hardware address in SystemConfiguration and are reported with the redacted value.

If your application needs the real link-layer address from the kernel APIs directly (for example to send raw Ethernet frames through BPF), it must hold the com.apple.developer.networking.topology-observation entitlement (available to all Apple developers by enabling the Network Topology Observation capability in Xcode 27). This is a restricted entitlement that must be authorized by a provisioning profile, which means command line tools have to be embedded in an app-like bundle (see Apple's Signing a daemon with a restricted entitlement documentation).

Optional dependencies:

Compilation

All platforms

  • Clone this repository
  • Update submodules: git submodule update --init

Windows

  • Using the provided bash script (gen_cmake.sh):
    • Run the script with whatever optional parameters required (run gen_cmake.sh -h to display the help)
    • Go into the generated output folder
    • Open the generated Visual Studio solution LA_networkInterfaceHelper.sln
    • Compile everything from Visual Studio
  • Manually issuing a CMake command:
    • Run a proper CMake command to generate a Visual Studio solution (or any other CMake generator matching your build toolchain)
    • Open the generated Visual Studio solution (or your other CMake generated files)
    • Compile everything from Visual Studio (or compile using your toolchain)

macOS

  • Using the provided bash script (gen_cmake.sh):
    • Run the script with whatever optional parameters required (run gen_cmake.sh -h to display the help)
    • Go into the generated output folder
    • Open the generated Xcode solution LA_networkInterfaceHelper.xcodeproj
    • Compile everything from Xcode
  • Use the -ios command switch when invoking gen_cmake.sh if you want to target the iOS platform
  • Manually issuing a CMake command:
    • Run a proper CMake command to generate a Xcode solution (or any other CMake generator matching your build toolchain)
    • Open the generated Xcode solution (or your other CMake generated files)
    • Compile everything from Xcode (or compile using your toolchain)

Linux

  • Using the provided bash script (gen_cmake.sh):
    • Run the script with either -debug or -release and whatever optional parameters required (run gen_cmake.sh -h to display the help)
    • Go into the generated output folder
    • Run make to compile everything
  • Manually issuing a CMake command:
    • Run a proper CMake command to generate Unix Makefiles (or any other CMake generator matching your build toolchain)
    • Go into the folder where the Unix Makefiles have been generated
    • Run make to compile everything (or compile using your toolchain)

Contributing code

Please read this file

Trademark legal notice

All product names, logos, brands and trademarks are property of their respective owners. All company, product and service names used in this library are for identification purposes only. Use of these names, logos, and brands does not imply endorsement.