vbl - VBindiff for Linux

Hex viewer, differ, dumper and editor

dynamic 16/24/32 byte Hex & ASCII view in a terminal

256TB Files & Devices

edit / insert / delete

zero-tolerant TurboSearch for SSD

SIMD speedup

diff mode

dump mode

64-bit static + dynamic

asm + disasm code

Features:

• Ascii search f
• Binary search
• Forward search n
• Backward search p
• Case insensitive i
• Search history Up Dn
• Search edit Ins Del ^u ^k
• Search highlight
• Search indentation
• Search interruption Esc
• Visual feedback
• Goto position decimal g
• Goto position percent
• Goto position hex (abcd 0x1234 1234x)
• Goto position 2** (kmgt)
• Goto position 10** (KMGT)
• Goto position *512 (s)
• Goto position *4096 (S)
• Goto position offset (+addr -addr)
• Goto position history Up Dn
• Goto last address ' <
• Goto last offset .
• Goto last offset neg ,
• Set last address l
• Set last address auto g f Home End
• Set jump address j
• Get jump address "
• Next difference Enter
• Prev difference # \
• Next different byte PgDn
• Prev different byte PgUp
• Sync 1. with 2. view 1
• Sync 2. with 1. view 2
• File position decimal
• File position percent
• File offset difference
• Smartscroll (single mode) ENTER
• Skip forward 4% + * =
• Skip backward 1% -
• ASCII-Mode (single mode) a
• Column raster r
• Edit file e
• Edit insert byte Ins
• Edit delete byte Del
• RW/RO detection
• Use only top file t
• Use only bottom file b
• Help window h
• Quit q
• Easter egg

Notes:

All operations take place in read-only mode.

Only if you exit the edit mode and there are changes and you explicitly confirm this will the file be temporarily opened for read/write.

With inserted or deleted bytes, the write can be huge, so it happens always in place.

The last address is auto set with initial Find, Goto w/o relative, home/end or manual with l.

A fixed jump address can be set with j and get with "; init with param + set last addr.

The starting point for seek next diff byte is bottom-right.

The starting point for seek prev diff byte is top-left; with added Page Up.

A pane offset difference remains during comparison.

Goto position is now 2** kmgt and 10** KMGT(S.I.); with added sector support.

Esc can interrupt the searches.

Only q quit the program.

Build:

# headers + *meson* (debian)
apt install libncurses-dev meson

meson setup vbl

### change thousands separator from dot/default to comma:
# meson configure -Dcpp_args="-DTHOU_SEP_COMMA=1" vbl

meson compile -C vbl

Exe:

./vbl/vbl               64-bit executable
./vbl/vbl-strip
./vbl/vbl-stat          static version
./vbl/vbl-stat-strip

Asm:

vbl/vbl_asm.lst:        cleaned assembly

vbl/vbl_asm-diff.lst:   more cleaned for diff/dwdiff

vbl/vbl_dis.lst:        disassembly with color codes

Screenshoots:

One File

ASCII Mode

Files >64GB

Two Files

You have to confirm long writes (>512MB)

Help Screen

Cmdline:

VBinDiff for Linux 4.4

	vbl file [file2] [addr] [addr2]                     // ncurses

	vbl file1 file2 -                                   // diff view

	vbl file1 file2 --                                  // diff return

	vbl file -  [start [end]] [length{l$}] [width{w$}]  // dump ascii

	vbl file -- [start [end]] [length{l$}]              // dump binary

// type 'h' for help

Shortcut:

vb () { [[ $2 ]] && vbl "$1" "$2" - || echo "vbl file1 file2 [-]";}