Introduction

The Nmap Scripting Engine was introduced in 2007 in Version 4.5, in order to extend Nmap's functionality to a whole new level by using the information gathered during a port or a network scan and performing additional tasks powered by the powerful scripting language Lua. This feature has become a whole arsenal by itself with almost 300 scripts already officially included. The amount of tasks you can accomplish with this feature is impressive, as you have learned throughout this book.

Lua is a scripting language currently used in other important projects, such as World of Warcraft, Wireshark, and Snort, for very good reasons. Lua is very lightweight and extensible. As an NSE developer, my experience with Lua has been very positive. The language is very powerful and flexible, yet with a clear and easy-to-learn syntax. Because Lua is a whole topic by itself, I will not be able to focus on all of its great features, but I recommend that you read the official reference manual at...