Wireshark hangs on "Initializing external capture plugins"

[LMS1]

Wireshark hangs on "Initializing external capture plugins" after installing the nRF Sniffer for Blluetooth LE capture tool. What may be the cause of such problem?

[Øyvind]

Hello, 

Can you please provide more information on what the issue is? What OS are you on? What version of Wireshark are you using? 

Thanks!
Kind regards,

Øyvind

[LMS1]

I am using Python 3.9.6. I am following the guide from infocenter for nRF Sniffer for BLE. I am not sure what do you mean by "run the tool correctly from Command Line". If you mean "nrf_sniffer_ble.bat --extcap-interfaces" then yes. Output matched example from guide.

[Øyvind]

Just tested the guide here as well, with no issues. What happens if you choose "Run as administrator"? If I do not do this, I get several questions on allowing Wireshark to make changes to my device. Could this be the issue on you side? 

[LMS1]

Now it works

[Øyvind]

Good to hear!

[Tox!c]

This is an old ticket, but I have the same issue with Wireshark 4.0.2 (v4.0.2-0-g415456d13370) on Windows 11 21H2.

The trace below shows that nrf_sniffer_ble.bat exits after ca. 2 minutes (timeout?)

 ** (wireshark:14344) 16:51:01.710693 [Capture DEBUG] C:\gitlab-builds\builds\MsQ3pox2\0\wireshark\wireshark\wsutil\ws_pipe.c:257 -- ws_pipe_spawn_sync(): command line: "c:\Program Files\Wireshark\extcap\nrf_sniffer_ble.bat" --extcap-interfaces --extcap-version=4.0
 ** (wireshark:14344) 16:53:05.181779 [Capture DEBUG] C:\gitlab-builds\builds\MsQ3pox2\0\wireshark\wireshark\wsutil\ws_pipe.c:495 -- ws_pipe_spawn_sync(): c:\Program Files\Wireshark\extcap\nrf_sniffer_ble.bat finished in 123466.199ms

I can observe the same timeout when launching the nrf_sniffer_ble.bat directly from the command line.

It looks like this occurs only when the bluetooth adapter of my laptop is on (which adds 2 extra Standard Serial over Bluetooth COM ports). Turning it off immediately unlocks nrf_sniffer_ble.bat and Wireshark behaves as expected.

Hope this helps.