How to provide inputfilefile(-iL) option in python nmap?

Question

In nmap command line, we can provide list of hosts in file and the file can be provided as an input using -iL parameter. I am not sure how to replicate the same function using python nmap. Python nmap documentation is not covering all examples. So requiring help in it.

Answer 1

You can use the -iL option as given below. It worked for me.

nm.scan(arguments='-iL /tmp/hosts.txt')

Full program given below

import sys
import os

import nmap                         # import nmap.py module
try:
    nm = nmap.PortScanner()         # instantiate nmap.PortScanner object
except nmap.PortScannerError:
    print('Nmap not found', sys.exc_info()[0])
    sys.exit(1)
except:
    print("Unexpected error:", sys.exc_info()[0])
    sys.exit(1)

nm.scan(arguments='-iL /tmp/hosts.txt')

for host in nm.all_hosts():
    print('----------------------------------------------------')
    print('Host : %s (%s)' % (host, nm[host].hostname()))
    print('State : {0}'.format(nm[host].state()))


# print result as CSV
print(nm.csv())

Answer 2

I don't think that python-nmap supports target lists out of the box. You will probably need to use python to open and parse the list yourself, and then execute the scans in a loop. I will probably look something like this:

import nmap
nm = nmap.PortScanner() 
port_range='22'   
with open('./path/to/list', 'r') as targets:
    for target in targets:
        nm.scan(target, port_range)
        # Do something with results