iptui — IPTABLES Rule Manager TUI

A terminal UI for browsing and editing iptables rules, written as a single-file Python 3 script using curses. Drills down through tables → chains → rules, with full create/read/update/delete support for rules and chains.

Features

• Browse all standard tables (filter, nat, mangle, raw, security), their chains (built-in policies and user-defined chains), and the rules within each chain — with live packet/byte counters
• Add, edit, delete, and reorder rules
• Rule editor with fields for protocol, source/destination, interfaces, ports, jump target, target options, and comment, plus a free-text "extra match arguments" field for any match module not covered by the form (e.g. -m conntrack --ctstate ESTABLISHED,RELATED) — a live preview shows the exact rule that will be applied
• Chain management: create, delete, rename, flush, set policy (ACCEPT/DROP), and zero counters
• All changes are applied immediately via iptables and the view is re-read from the live ruleset, so what you see always matches iptables -S

Requirements

• Python 3.8+
• iptables
• Root privileges (reading and modifying iptables rules requires CAP_NET_ADMIN)

Usage

chmod +x iptui.py
sudo ./iptui.py

Key bindings

Tables screen

Key	Action
↑/k, ↓/j	Move selection
Enter	Open table's chains
q / Esc	Quit

Chains screen

Key	Action
↑/k, ↓/j	Move selection
Enter	View chain's rules
n	New chain
d	Delete chain (user-defined only)
r	Rename chain (user-defined only)
p	Set policy ACCEPT/DROP (built-in only)
f	Flush chain
z	Zero counters
Esc	Back to tables
q	Quit

Rules screen

Key	Action
↑/k, ↓/j	Move selection
a	Append new rule
i	Insert new rule before selection
Enter / e	Edit selected rule
d	Delete selected rule
K / J	Move selected rule up / down
z	Zero counters
Esc	Back to chains
q	Quit

Rule editor

Key	Action
Tab / ↓, Shift+Tab / ↑	Move between fields
(typing)	Edit current field
Enter	Save rule
Esc	Cancel