A protocol analyzer that produces raw output is which of the following?

tcpdump is a classic command-line network packet analyzer that captures and displays network packet headers and payload contents directly as raw output to stdout or text streams. Unlike graphical analyzer applications that process and render capture data into complex user interfaces with parsed drop-down tree views, tcpdump prints raw packet headers, hex dumps, and ASCII translations sequentially in plain text. This raw output output model makes tcpdump extremely lightweight and suitable for low-power industrial control systems, headless servers, and automated script pipelines where unformatted or minimally formatted packet data must be captured and logged efficiently without graphical interface dependencies.

B: Wireshark is a graphical network protocol analyzer that automatically dissects protocol fields into structured, hierarchical visual packet details rather than printing simple raw text stdout. C: Capsa is a Windows GUI-based network analyzer tool designed for graphic visualization, network statistics reporting, and visual packet decoding. D: CommView is a commercial packet interception utility featuring a graphical user interface tailored for visual data representation and graphical decoding.

Kozierok, C. M. (2005). The TCP/IP Guide: A Comprehensive, Illustrated Internet Protocols Reference, No Starch Press, Chapter 84: "Network Troubleshooting Utilities", pp. 1475-1480.

tcpdump man page (v4.99.0), tcpdump - dump traffic on a network, FreeBSD/Linux Documentation Project.