Netcat

In Computing, netcat is a Computer network utility for reading from and writing to network connections on either Transmission Control Protocol or User Datagram Protocol. It is designed in a thin and simple way, which makes it easy to incorporate in larger applications. Because of its versatility, netcat is also called the TCP/IP Swiss Army knife .

The original version of netcat is a UNIX program. Its author is known only as *Hobbit*. A Microsoft Windows version of netcat was created by Weld Pond.

Now netcat is fully POSIX compatible and there is a rewrite from scratch known as GNU Netcat, maintained by Giovanni Giacobbi.

=External links=

*[http://netcat.sourceforge.net/ GNU Netcat] *[http://www.vulnwatch.org/netcat/ www.vulnwatch.org/netcat/] Netcat for Windows