NAME

    hexpeek - edit, dump, pack, and diff binary files in hex and bits

SYNOPSIS

    hexpeek [OPTIONS] INFILE0 [INFILE1]
    hexview [OPTIONS] INFILE0 [INFILE1]
    hexDump [OPTIONS] INFILE0 [INFILE1]
    hexpack [OPTIONS] INFILE0 [INFILE1]
    hexdiff [OPTIONS] INFILE0 [INFILE1]

DESCRIPTION

    hexpeek (TM) is a binary editor designed for efficient operation on huge
    files, but works on any file. It is not plagued by size-related crashes,
    freezes, and glitches because it does not attempt to map files into its
    memory; instead, it operates on files directly to fulfill user commands.

    hexpeek has four main modes of operation: prompt, command, pack, and
    recovery. Prompt mode is entered by default, subject to OPTIONS. When
    invoked as hexview, hexDump, hexpack, or hexdiff, hexpeek runs as if given
    one of the flags -r, -dump, -pack, or -diff respectively.

    Except when specifically indicated otherwise, hexpeek input and output are
    in unprefixed hexadecimal. This allows the user to work in hexadecimal
    without needing to prefix every number with "0x".

    Thank you for trying hexpeek. Send your comments to hexpeek@hexpeek.com.

OPTIONS

    Flags starting with "+" invert the respective flags with "-".

    -h              Print usage text about commonly used options; then exit.

    -help           Print more complete help text; then exit.

    -v              Print short version string; then exit.

    -version        Print long version string; then exit.

    -license        Print license text; then exit.

    -d <FD>         Treat <FD>, a _decimal_ integer, as an already-open file
                    descriptor and use it as the next file. Functionality on
                    non-seekable files is limited (see LIMITATIONS below).

    -r              Open subsequent infiles read-only.

    -w              Open subsequent infiles writeable.

    -W              Like -w, but do not creat infiles that do not exist.

    +ik             Disable insert and kill commands.

    -x <CMDS>       Execute semicolon-delimited commands (see COMMANDS below).

    -dump           Dump a whole single infile. Same as "-x 0:max".

    -pack           Treat infile as a hexpeek dump and pack it back into the
                    outfile as binary. For best results, run with the same
                    option flags with which the original dump was created.

    -diff           Diff two files. Same as "-x '$0@0:max~$1@0:max'".

    -s <START>      With -dump or -diff, start output at given file offset.

    -l <LEN>        Like -s, but stop output after <LEN> octets are processed.

    -o <OUTFILE>    Write output to the given file.

    [-|+]SET [ARG]  Set the given setting (for all applicable display modes).
                    SET may be one of: endian, hex, bits, rlen, slen, line,
                    cols, group, margin, scalar, prefix, autoskip, diffskip,
                    text, and ruler. These options accept the same arguments
                    and have the same effect as the commands of the same names
                    (see COMMANDS below).

    -b , -c , -g    Synonyms of -bits , -cols , and -group respectively.

    -p              Output data in plain mode, which is the equivalent of
                    "-c 0 -g 0 -margin 0 +autoskip +diffskip +text +ruler".

    +lineterm       Skip line breaks in output.

    -format <FMT>   Specify group delimiters. This both controls print output
                    and allows the delimiters to be silently ignored in data
                    input. Default: "%_l? %_g", which prints a leading space
                    before each group except the zeroth group (if margin > 0,
                    a space will be printed as part of the margin separator).

    -unique         Skip uniqueness check - assume all infiles are unique.
                    See warning in LIMITATIONS.

    +tty            Skip TTY check - assume standard streams are not TTYs.

    -pedantic       Generate a user-level error if filezone information is
                    unspecified or ambiguous (instead of auto-inferring what to
                    do) or if a print or diff (except with ":max") attempts
                    to read beyond end of file (instead of printing nothing).

    [-|+]strict     Toggle strict failure mode, which, when enabled, causes
                    hexpeek to fail for user-level errors (like a malformed
                    command string). This mode is enabled by default when
                    hexpeek is run non-interactively.

    -backup <DEPTH> Backup depth may be 0 (to disable), max (0x20), or any
                    number therebetween. The default depth is 8.

    -backup sync    Aggressively sync backup to disk.

    -recover        Prompt to revert operations recorded in backup files.

    -trace <FILE>   Trace to the given file.

    --              Denote end of option flags.

COMMANDS

    q[uit]          Quit the program.

    stop            Exit without unlinking backup files.

    h[elp] [TOPIC]  Show general or specific helptext.

    files           List open files with their paths (with C escapes for
                    non-printable characters), writeability, lengths, and
                    current offsets.

    reset [$FILE]   Reset the current offset of FILE if specified, otherwise
                    reset the current offsets of all open infiles.

    settings        List the values of various settings.

    endian<b|l>     Set big- (default) or little-endian mode. Little-endian
                    mode is not compatible with zero group width.

    hex[l|u]        Switch to hexadecimal display mode. The optional last
                    character may be used to set the case of hex numerals to
                    lower (default) or upper.

    bits            Switch to bits display mode. This affects file data only,
                    not scalar (control) information.

    rlen <WIDTH>    Set default read length for the current display mode.

    slen <WIDTH>    Set search print length for the current display mode.
                    If 0, print only address of search match.

    line <WIDTH>    Set line width for the current display mode; 0 disables.

    cols <WIDTH>    Set rlen, slen, and line.

    group <WIDTH>   Set group width for the current display mode; 0 disables.
                    This option controls how many octets are printed between
                    spaces (or other delimiters specified by -format).

    margin <WIDTH>  Set octet width of printed file offset; 0 disables; "full"
                    sets to maximum available width (default).

    scalar <BASE>   Interpret scalar input according to the given <BASE>. Valid
                    arguments are 0x10 (default) and 0. If 0, scalar input are
                    interpreted as decimal unless prefixed with "0x" (hex) or
                    "0" (octal). This flag does not affect scalar output.

    [+]prefix       Print scalars with a "0x" prefix (default off).

    [+]autoskip     Toggle autoskip mode. If on (default when interactive),
                    repeated lines in dumps are replaced with "*".

    [+]diffskip     Toggle diffskip mode. If on, identical lines in diffs are
                    skipped.

    [+]text[=CODE]  Toggle dump of text characters in a column to the right of
                    print output. The optional argument controls the character
                    encoding and should be ascii or ebcdic. Defaults on when
                    interactive and line width is non-zero.

    [+]ruler        Toggle octet ruler.

    Numeric         [+][$FILE@][HEXOFF][,HEXLEN][+][SUBCOMMAND]
                    [+][$FILE@][HEXOFF][:HEXLIM][+][SUBCOMMAND]
                       ^--------filezone-------^

        Execute a subcommand over a given filezone. If specified, FILE must be
        a numeric index; otherwise, file $0 will be used. HEXOFF may be used
        to specify an absolute file offset if positive, a relative offset from
        file end if negative, or the current offset if "@@" or not given.

        HEXLEN is an optional length argument to the subcommand.
        HEXLIM specifies a length of HEXLIM - HEXOFF, or may be "max".

        SUBCOMMAND may be one of: p, /, ~, r, i, k, their long forms, and
        offset. If no subcommand is specified, an implicit print is done.

        If "+" precedes the filezone, file offset will be incremented before
        subcommand is run by the number of octets to be processed. If instead
        "+" follows, file offset will be incremented after subcommand is run
        by the number of octets processed.

        An empty line at the prompt is equivalent to "+", and may be used to
        page through a file.

    p[rint][v] , v

        Output data starting at file offset. If HEXLEN is specified, that many
        octets are read; otherwise, the default number of octets are read. The
        output includes a left margin with file offset information. When "p"
        is given explicitly, offset start is outputted before file data.

        Including "v" prints verbosely: each output line shows the file offset
        and data for just one octet with hexadecimal, decimal, octal, bits,
        high bit/low bit/bit count, and text formats shown side-by-side.

        If autoskip is enabled, repeated lines are replaced with a single "*".

    offset

        Seek to the filezone offset and print it. Useful in scripts.

    search <PATTERN> , /<PATTERN>

        Search for the argument data within the specified filezone (or to file
        end if unspecified). A valid PATTERN is either:
            (1) fully specified octets in hexadecimal or bits (depending on
                mode), any number of spaces between octets, and the "."
                character (which  matches any value); or
            (2) a filezone of the form described above, in which case data
                from that zone is used as search input. If filezone length is
                unspecified, the default length of 1 is used.

        If the search succeeds, the file offset is set to the beginning of the
        first found match; unless "+" follows the filezone, in which case the
        file offset is set to immediately _after_ the first found match or
        to immediately _after_ the search area if there was no match.

    ~[ ][FILEZONE]

        Perform a diff of two filezones. If no argument is given and two files
        are open, the diff is done between the two files. If two octets at a
        given relative offset are the same, they are printed as underscores.
        If diffskip is enabled, identical lines are not printed.

    /~[ ][FILEZONE]

        Search for the next difference between two filezones.

    r[eplace ]<PATTERN>

        Replace octets in the filezone with the argument data. The argument
        is of the same form as for the search command, but the "." matching
        character is not recognized. If HEXLEN is specified and is greater than
        the octet length of the input data, the data will be repeated to fill
        HEXLEN octets.

    i[nsert ]<PATTERN>

        Like replace, but expand file at file offset by number of octets to
        be written, thus preserving existing data.

    k[ill] , delete

        Remove the data in the specified filezone. If HEXLEN is unspecified,
        one octet will be removed. Note that a space is required between any
        numeric portion of the command and "delete".

    ops

        Show operations available to be undone. For each operation the depth,
        operation number, and command string are printed.

    u[ndo] [DEPTH]

        Undo the number of operations specified by DEPTH (defaults to 1).

EXAMPLES

    0               From beginning of file, print default number of octets.

    10,40           Print 40 octets starting at the 10th octet in the file.

    ,2p             Print two octets starting at current file offset.

    7:C/.1          Within domain starting at file offset 7 and ending at B
                    inclusively, search for the first octet the second nibble
                    of which is 1.

    0:100 r 00      Zero out the first 100 octets.

    100 r 1122      Replace the 100th octet with value 11 and the 101st octet
                    with value 22.

    -1r33           Replace the last octet in the file with the value 33.

    i 44            Insert one octet with value 44 before the current offset.

    -0i 5566        Append two octets to the end of file with values 55 and 66.

    k               Remove one octet at the current file offset.

    1:3k            Remove the first and second octets of the file.

    20:60 r @30,3   Replace the 40 octet chunk starting at 20 with the values
                    located in 30:33 repeated.

DEFAULTS

    Unless set on the command line, column width defaults to the greatest
    power of 2 number of octets that fit in an 80 character terminal.

LIMITATIONS

    hexpeek requires (and attempts to enforce) that each infile refers to a
    unique file. Data corruption may result if the same file is opened as
    multiple infiles during a hexpeek run.

    Functionality on non-seekable files is inherently limited because hexpeek
    operates on them with a one-way seek. Thus, you can not seek backwards and
    post-incrementation for reads is always in effect. Moreover, the current
    offset has no impact on write operations (a duplex connection is assumed).
    Finally, the backup function does not work with non-seekable files for
    obvious reasons.

    The insert and kill commands are inherently inefficient because they must
    move all the data after the point of insertion or deletion. Consider
    combining repeated insertions (or kills) into one large operation to limit
    the amount of time spent in file rearrangement.

    Maximum line, group, and search argument octet width are 0x10000.

BACKUP AND RECOVERY

    When in write mode, unless backup depth is 0, hexpeek creates 2 hidden
    backup files with file extension hexpeek-backup. Before executing any
    writeable command, hexpeek writes information to a backup file which is
    sufficient to recover previous data file state in case of program crash or
    user error.

    When an error occurs, use the undo command to revert it; or use stop and
    then invoke 'hexpeek -recover'. Otherwise, on successful exit, hexpeek
    automatically unlinks the backup files. A redo can be performed with the
    command line history functionality (if built with support).

VERSION

    hexpeek version 1.0.20200804

AUTHOR

    Copyright 2020 Michael Reilly. ALL WARRANTIES DISCLAIMED.

    hexpeek is a trademark of Michael Reilly.

SEE ALSO

    https://www.hexpeek.com