Using ARPing to perform layer 2 discovery

ARPing is a command-line network utility that has a functionality that is similar to the commonly used ping utility. This tool can identify whether a live host is on a local network at a given IP by supplying that IP address as an argument. This recipe will discuss how to use ARPing to scan for live hosts on a network.

Getting ready

To use ARPing to perform ARP discovery, you will need to have at least one system on the LAN that will respond to ARP requests. In the examples provided, a combination of Linux and Windows systems are used. For more information on setting up systems in a local lab environment, please refer to the Installing Metasploitable2 and Installing Windows Server recipes in Chapter 1, Getting Started. Additionally, this section will require a script to be written to the filesystem, using a text editor such as VIM or Nano. For more information on writing scripts, please refer to the Using text editors (VIM and Nano) recipe in Chapter...