Programming

I wish to develop an application to monitor the network traffic of my system.

I wish to know which computer networked to me is using most of the bandwidth. I know the basics of python but do not know how to start the work.. please suggest some good methods to follow.

Well, looking for the input is first order of business, not a programming matter, more system sw for your flavor. If you have firewall sw, it may be logging all packets. Network sw might log all packet headers. What is your platform?

ubuntu 10.10, 2.6.35-29-generic. Can such a method also be implemented to detect the network traffic through a router..

Also is it possible to read the header information of packets going to that system..

If you are running on a router, there are ways to log all packets, or to be called for every packet, but often if they do not have a logging feature, you need to install a firewall just to do the logging. Now, remotely, on telnet accessible hard coded routers, not so easy.

If you get a product for snooping the net, it turns your lan card to promiscuous and you see all traffic on the local lan segment/collision domain. If you are on a switch, bridged cd or smart hub, it may mask packets from you.

Perhaps I'm off topic. But did you check if such tool already exist? iftop comes for instance to my mind.

Brgds,
/Lew

I am a beginner in programming for network application, wish to learn how it can be achieved..

Thanks for the suggestion of iftop application..

Alright, fair enough. This is IMHO a good project to start and learn.

It has been a long time I've done this, but unless my memory is defective, you'll definitely need to learn about libpcap. Since you're aiming at programming in python - which is too an excellent idea - you should consider pylibpcap or similar (google for libpcap python).

Just my 2c,
/Lew