get the mac address of the current machine with node.js using getmac

Question

I am working on this question.

Now I am trying to use getmac

to get the mac address of the current machine with node.js.

I followed the installation instructions. But when I run this code:

require('getmac').getMac(function(err,macAddress){
    if (err)  throw err;
    console.log(macAddress);    
});

I get this error:

Error: Command failed: the command "getmac" could not be found

Do you know how to get this to work?

Answer 1

On NodeJS ≥ 0.11 the mac address for each network interface is in the output of os.networkInterfaces(), e.g.

require('os').networkInterfaces()

{ eth0: 
   [ { address: 'fe80::cae0:ebff:fe14:1dab',
       netmask: 'ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff::',
       family: 'IPv6',
       mac: 'c8:e0:eb:14:1d:ab',
       scopeid: 4,
       internal: false },
     { address: '192.168.178.22',
       netmask: '255.255.255.0',
       family: 'IPv4',
       mac: 'c8:e0:eb:14:1d:ab',
       internal: false } ] }

In NodeJS ≤ 0.10 you need to find out the mac addresses on your own, but there are packages to help you with that: node-macaddress (disclaimer: I am the author of said package).

This package also selects one interface for your host so that you can do just

require('node-macaddress').one(function (err, addr) { console.log(addr); }

On node ≥ 0.11 you are not required to use the asynchronous version:

var addr = require('node-macaddress').one();

Since you are typically only interested in "the hosts macaddress" (although there is no such thing as a host can have multiple network interfaces each having an individual mac address), this call will give you exactly that.

Answer 2

A Node.JS script can discover the MAC address of the current machine by examining the link-local IPv6 address. (caveat: this requires the IPv6 stack to be active within the O/S, which is increasingly common)

e.g.

LL: fe80::0211:22ff:fe33:4455
MAC:      0011:22     33:4455

Based on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPv6_address#Modified_EUI-64

1. remove the 0xfffe from the middle
2. bitwise invert bit#41 using XOR 0x020000000000

On Windows it is necessary to deactivate randomizeidentifiers by running the elevated command:

netsh interface ipv6 set global randomizeidentifiers=disabled

The following code uses this technique to generate a Variant 1 UUID (tail generation happens just once):

function generateUUID() {
    generateUUID.tail = generateUUID.tail || (function(nics) {
        var nic, index, addr, retn;
        for (nic in nics) { // try to obtain the MAC address from the IPv6 scope-local address
            for (index in nics[nic]) {
                addr = nics[nic][index];
                if (!addr.internal) {
                    if (addr.address.indexOf('fe80::') === 0) { // found scope-local
                        retn = retn || addr.address.slice(6).split(/:/).map(function(v, i, a) {
                            return parseInt(v, 16);
                        });
                    }
                }
            }
        }
        if (!retn) { // no IPv6 so generate random MAC with multicast bit set
            index = Math.pow(2, 16);
            retn = [];
            retn.push(Math.floor(Math.random() * index) | 0x1000); // set multicast bit
            retn.push(Math.floor(Math.random() * index));
            retn.push(Math.floor(Math.random() * index));
            retn.push(Math.floor(Math.random() * index));
        }
        retn[3] = 0x10000 | retn[3];
        retn[2] = 0x10000 | retn[1] & 0xff00 | retn[2] & 0x00ff; // eliminate FFFE from xxxx:xxFF:FExx:xxxx
        retn[1] = 0x10000 | retn[0] ^ 0x0200; // invert bit#41
        retn[0] = 0x18000 | process.pid & 0x3fff;
        retn = retn.map(function(v, i, a) {
            return v.toString(16).slice(1)
        });
        return retn[0] + '-' + retn[1] + retn[2] + retn[3];
    })(require('os').networkInterfaces());

    var head = process.hrtime(), now = Math.floor(Date.now() / 1000);
    head[1] = Math.floor(head[1] * 0.268435456); // 2^28 / 10^9
    head[2] = (0x11000 | head[1] & 0x0fff).toString(16).slice(1);
    head[1] = (0x10000 | head[1] >>> 12 & 0xffff).toString(16).slice(1);
    head[0] = (4294967296 + now).toString(16).slice(1);
    return head.concat(generateUUID.tail).join('-');
};

Answer 3

You need to install getmac node_module using npm install getmac in command prompt/terminal. Then, it will work.

Answer 4

install the package getmac using the terminal.

npm install --save getmac

using in node

const getmac = require('getmac')

const callMac = () =>{
    return getmac.default()
}

output >> "00:05:1b:61:d3:05"

Answer 5

You must run it with root user or command.