IPSET(8)

NAME
ipset - administration tool for IP sets

SYNOPSIS
ipset -N set type-specification [options]
ipset -[XFLSHh] [set] [options]
ipset -[EW] from-set to-set
ipset -[ADU] set entry
ipset -B set entry -b binding
ipset -T set entry [-b binding]
ipset -R

DESCRIPTION
ipset is used to set up, maintain and inspect so called IP sets in the Linux kernel. Depending on the type, an IP set may store IP addresses, (TCP/UDP) port numbers or additional informations besides IP addresses: the word IP means a general term here. See the set type definitions below.

Any entry in a set can be bound to another set, which forms a relationship between a set element and the set it is bound to. In order to define a binding it is not required that the entry be already added to the set. The sets may have a default binding, which is valid for every set element for which there is no binding defined at all.

IP set bindings pointing to sets and iptables matches and targets referring to sets creates references, which protects the given sets in the kernel. A set cannot be removed (destroyed) while there is a single reference pointing to it.

OPTIONS
The options that are recognized by ipset can be divided into several different groups.

  COMMANDS
These options specify the specific action to perform. Only one of them can be specified on the command line unless otherwise specified below. For all the long versions of the command and option names, you need to use only enough letters to ensure that ipset can differentiate it from all other options.

-N, --create setname type type-specific-options
    Create a set identified with setname and specified type. Type-specific options must be supplied.

-X, --destroy [setname]
    Destroy the specified set, or all sets if none or the keyword :all: is specified. Before destroying the set, all bindings belonging to the set elements and the default binding of the set are removed. If the set has got references, nothing is done.

-F, --flush [setname]
    Delete all entries from the specified set, or flush all sets if none or the keyword :all: is given. Bindings are not affected by the flush operation.

-E, --rename from-setname to-setname
    Rename a set. Set identified by to-setname must not exist.

-W, --swap from-setname to-setname
    Swap the content of two sets, or in another words, exchange the name of two sets. The referred sets must exist and identical type of sets can be swapped only.

-L, --list [setname]
    List the entries and bindings for the specified set, or for all sets if none or the keyword :all: is given. The -n, --numeric option can be used to suppress name lookups and generate numeric output. When the -s, --sorted option is given, the entries are listed sorted (if the given set type supports the operation).

-S, --save [setname]
    Save the given set, or all sets if none or the keyword :all: is specified to stdout in a format that --restore can read.

-R, --restore
    Restore a saved session generated by --save. The saved session can be fed from stdin. When generating a session file please note that the supported commands (create set, add element, bind) must appear in a strict order: first create the set, then add all elements. Then create the next set, add all its elements and so on. Finally you can list all binding commands. Also, it is a restore operation, so the sets being restored must not exist.

-A, --add setname IP
    Add an IP to a set.

-D, --del setname IP
    Delete an IP from a set.

-T, --test setname IP
    Test wether an IP is in a set or not. Exit status number is zero if the tested IP is in the set and nonzero if it is missing from the set.

-T, --test setname IP --binding to-setname
    Test wether the IP belonging to the set points to the specified binding. Exit status number is zero if the binding points to the specified set, otherwise it is nonzero. The keyword :default: can be used to test the default binding of the set.

-B, --bind setname IP --binding to-setname
    Bind the IP in setname to to-setname.

-U, --unbind setname IP
    Delete the binding belonging to IP in set setname.

-H, --help [settype]
    Print help and settype specific help if settype specified.

At the -B, -U and -T commands you can use the token :default: to bind, unbind or test the default binding of a set instead of an IP. At the -U command you can use the token :all: to destroy the bindings of all elements of a set.

  OTHER OPTIONS
The following additional options can be specified:

-b, --binding setname
    The option specifies the value of the binding for the -B binding command, for which it is a mandatory option. You can use it in the -T test command as well to test bindings.

-s, --sorted
    Sorted output. When listing sets, entries are listed sorted.

-n, --numeric
    Numeric output. When listing sets, bindings, IP addresses and port numbers will be printed in numeric format. By default the program will try to display them as host names, network names or services (whenever applicable), which can trigger slow DNS lookups.

-q, --quiet
    Suppress any output to stdout and stderr. ipset will still return possible errors.

SET TYPES
ipset supports the following set types:

  ipmap
The ipmap set type uses a memory range, where each bit represents one IP address. An ipmap set can store up to 65536 (B-class network) IP addresses. The ipmap set type is very fast and memory cheap, great for use when one want to match certain IPs in a range. If the optional --netmask parameter is specified with a CIDR netmask value between 1-31 then network addresses are stored in the given set: i.e an IP address will be in the set if the network address, which is resulted by masking the address with the specified netmask, can be found in the set.

Options to use when creating an ipmap set:

--from from-IP

--to to-IP
    Create an ipmap set from the specified range.

--network IP/mask
    Create an ipmap set from the specified network.

--netmask CIDR-netmask
    When the optional --netmask parameter specified, network addresses will be stored in the set instead of IP addresses, and the from-IP parameter must be a network address. The CIDR-netmask value must be between 1-31.

  macipmap
The macipmap set type uses a memory range, where each 8 bytes represents one IP and a MAC addresses. A macipmap set type can store up to 65536 (B-class network) IP addresses with MAC. When adding an entry to a macipmap set, you must specify the entry as IP,MAC. When deleting or testing macipmap entries, the ,MAC part is not mandatory.

Options to use when creating an macipmap set:

--from from-IP

--to to-IP
    Create a macipmap set from the specified range.

--network IP/mask
    Create a macipmap set from the specified network.

--matchunset
    When the optional --matchunset parameter specified, IP addresses which could be stored in the set but not set yet, will always match.

Please note, the set and SET netfilter kernel modules always use the source MAC address from the packet to match, add or delete entries from a macipmap type of set.

  portmap
The portmap set type uses a memory range, where each bit represents one port. A portmap set type can store up to 65536 ports. The portmap set type is very fast and memory cheap.

Options to use when creating an portmap set:

--from from-port

--to to-port
    Create a portmap set from the specified range.

  iphash
The iphash set type uses a hash to store IP addresses. In order to avoid clashes in the hash double-hashing, and as a last resort, dynamic growing of the hash performed. The iphash set type is great to store random addresses. If the optional --netmask parameter is specified with a CIDR netmask value between 1-31 then network addresses are stored in the given set: i.e an IP address will be in the set if the network address, which is resulted by masking the address with the specified netmask, can be found in the set.

Options to use when creating an iphash set:

--hashsize hashsize
    The initial hash size (default 1024)

--probes probes
    How many times try to resolve clashing at adding an IP to the hash by double-hashing (default 8).

--resize percent
    Increase the hash size by this many percent (default 50) when adding an IP to the hash could not be performed after probes number of double-hashing.

--netmask CIDR-netmask
    When the optional --netmask parameter specified, network addresses will be stored in the set instead of IP addresses. The CIDR-netmask value must be between 1-31.

The iphash type of sets can store up to 65536 entries. If a set is full, no new entries can be added to it.

Sets created by zero valued resize parameter won't be resized at all. The lookup time in an iphash type of set grows approximately linearly with the value of the probes parameter. In general higher probe value results better utilized hash while smaller value produces larger, sparser hash.

  nethash
The nethash set type uses a hash to store different size of network addresses. The IP "address" used in the ipset commands must be in the form IP-address/cidr-size where the CIDR block size must be in the inclusive range of 1-31. In order to avoid clashes in the hash double-hashing, and as a last resort, dynamic growing of the hash performed.

Options to use when creating an nethash set:

--hashsize hashsize
    The initial hash size (default 1024)

--probes probes
    How many times try to resolve clashing at adding an IP to the hash by double-hashing (default 4).

--resize percent
    Increase the hash size by this many percent (default 50) when adding an IP to the hash could not be performed after

The nethash type of sets can store up to 65536 entries. If a set is full, no new entries can be added to it.

An IP address will be in a nethash type of set if it belongs to any of the netblocks added to the set. The matching always start from the smallest size of netblock (most specific netmask) to the largest ones (least specific netmasks). When adding/deleting IP addresses to a nethash set by the SET netfilter kernel module, it will be added/deleted by the smallest netblock size which can be found in the set, or by /31 if the set is empty.

The lookup time in a nethash type of set grows approximately linearly with the times of the probes parameter and the number of different mask parameters in the hash. Otherwise the same speed and memory efficiency comments applies here as at the iphash type.

  ipporthash
The ipporthash set type uses a hash to store IP address and port pairs. In order to avoid clashes in the hash double-hashing, and as a last resort, dynamic growing of the hash performed. An ipporthash set can store up to 65536 (B-class network) IP addresses with all possible port values. When adding, deleting and testing values in an ipporthash type of set, the entries must be specified as "IP,port".

The ipporthash types of sets evaluates two src/dst parameters of the set match and SET target.

Options to use when creating an ipporthash set:

--from from-IP

--to to-IP
    Create an ipporthash set from the specified range.

--network IP/mask
    Create an ipporthash set from the specified network.

--hashsize hashsize
    The initial hash size (default 1024)

--probes probes
    How many times try to resolve clashing at adding an IP to the hash by double-hashing (default 8).

--resize percent
    Increase the hash size by this many percent (default 50) when adding an IP to the hash could not be performed after probes number of double-hashing.

The same resizing, speed and memory efficiency comments applies here as at the iphash type.

  ipportiphash
The ipportiphash set type uses a hash to store IP address,port and IP address triples. The first IP address must come form a maximum /16 sized network or range while the port number and the second IP address parameters are arbitrary. When adding, deleting and testing values in an ipportiphash type of set, the entries must be specified as "IP,port,IP".

The ipportiphash types of sets evaluates three src/dst parameters of the set match and SET target.

Options to use when creating an ipportiphash set:

--from from-IP

--to to-IP
    Create an ipportiphash set from the specified range.

--network IP/mask
    Create an ipportiphash set from the specified network.

--hashsize hashsize
    The initial hash size (default 1024)

--probes probes
    How many times try to resolve clashing at adding an IP to the hash by double-hashing (default 8).

--resize percent
    Increase the hash size by this many percent (default 50) when adding an IP to the hash could not be performed after probes number of double-hashing.

The same resizing, speed and memory efficiency comments applies here as at the iphash type.

  ipportnethash
The ipportnethash set type uses a hash to store IP address, port, and network address triples. The IP address must come form a maximum /16 sized network or range while the port number and the network address parameters are arbitrary, but the size of the network address must be between /1-/31. When adding, deleting and testing values in an ipportnethash type of set, the entries must be specified as "IP,port,IP/cidr-size".

The ipportnethash types of sets evaluates three src/dst parameters of the set match and SET target.

Options to use when creating an ipportnethash set:

--from from-IP

--to to-IP
    Create an ipporthash set from the specified range.

--network IP/mask
    Create an ipporthash set from the specified network.

--hashsize hashsize
    The initial hash size (default 1024)

--probes probes
    How many times try to resolve clashing at adding an IP to the hash by double-hashing (default 8).

--resize percent
    Increase the hash size by this many percent (default 50) when adding an IP to the hash could not be performed after probes number of double-hashing.

The same resizing, speed and memory efficiency comments applies here as at the iphash type.

  iptree
The iptree set type uses a tree to store IP addresses, optionally with timeout values.

Options to use when creating an iptree set:

--timeout value
    The timeout value for the entries in seconds (default 0)

If a set was created with a nonzero valued --timeout parameter then one may add IP addresses to the set with a specific timeout value using the syntax IP,timeout-value. Similarly to the hash types, the iptree type of sets can store up to 65536 entries.

  iptreemap
The iptreemap set type uses a tree to store IP addresses or networks, where the last octet of an IP address are stored in a bitmap. As input entry, you can add IP addresses, CIDR blocks or network ranges to the set. Network ranges can be specified in the format IP1-IP2

Options to use when creating an iptreemap set:

--gc value
    How often the garbage collection should be called, in seconds (default 300)

  setlist
The setlist type uses a simple list in which you can store sets. By the ipset command you can add, delete and test sets in a setlist type of set. You can specify the sets as "setname[,after|before,setname]". By default new sets are added after (appended to) the existing elements. Setlist type of sets cannot be added to a setlist type of set.

Options to use when creating a setlist type of set:

--size size
    Create a setlist type of set with the given size (default 8).

By the set match or SET target of iptables you can test, add or delete entries in the sets. The match will try to find a matching IP address/port in the sets and the target will try to add the IP address/port to the first set to which it can be added. The number of src,dst options of the match and target are important: sets which eats more src,dst parameters than specified are skipped, while sets with equal or less parameters are checked, elements added. For example if a and b are setlist type of sets then in the command

iptables -m set --match-set a src,dst -j SET --add-set b src,dst
    the match and target will skip any set in a and b which stores data triples, but will check all sets with single or double data storage in a set and add src to the first single or src,dst to the first double data storage set in b.

You can imagine a setlist type of set as an ordered union of the set elements.

GENERAL RESTRICTIONS
Setnames starting with colon (:) cannot be defined. Zero valued set entries cannot be used with hash type of sets.

COMMENTS
If you want to store same size subnets from a given network (say /24 blocks from a /8 network), use the ipmap set type. If you want to store random same size networks (say random /24 blocks), use the iphash set type. If you have got random size of netblocks, use nethash.

Old separator tokens (':' and '%") are still accepted.

DIAGNOSTICS
Various error messages are printed to standard error. The exit code is 0 for correct functioning. Errors which appear to be caused by invalid or abused command line parameters cause an exit code of 2, and other errors cause an exit code of 1.

BUGS
Bugs? No, just funny features. :-) OK, just kidding...

SEE ALSO
iptables(8),

AUTHORS
Jozsef Kadlecsik wrote ipset, which is based on ippool by Joakim Axelsson, Patrick Schaaf and Martin Josefsson.

Sven Wegener wrote the iptreemap type.

LAST REMARK
I stand on the shoulders of giants.