hexedit
(1)
Name
hexedit - view and edit files in hexadecimal or in ASCII
Synopsis
hexedit [-s | --sector] [-m | --maximize] [-h | --help]
[filename]
Description
User Commands HEXEDIT(1)
NAME
hexedit - view and edit files in hexadecimal or in ASCII
SYNOPSIS
hexedit [-s | --sector] [-m | --maximize] [-h | --help]
[filename]
DESCRIPTION
hexedit shows a file both in ASCII and in hexadecimal. The
file can be a device as the file is read a piece at a time.
You can modify the file and search through it.
OPTIONS
-s, --sector
Format the display to have entire sectors.
-m, --maximize
Try to maximize the display.
-h, --help
Show the usage.
COMMANDS (quickly)
Moving
<, > : go to start/end of the file
Right: next character
Left: previous character
Down: next line
Up: previous line
Home: beginning of line
End: end of line
PUp: page forward
PDown: page backward
Miscellaneous
F2: save
F3: load file
F1: help
Ctrl-L: redraw
Ctrl-Z: suspend
Ctrl-X: save and exit
Ctrl-C: exit without saving
Tab: toggle hex/ascii
Return: go to
Backspace: undo previous character
Ctrl-U: undo all
Ctrl-S: search forward
Ctrl-R: search backward
Cut&Paste
Ctrl-Space: set mark
SunOS 5.11 Last change: 12 July 1998 1
User Commands HEXEDIT(1)
Esc-W: copy
Ctrl-Y: paste
Esc-Y: paste into a file
Esc-I: fill
COMMANDS (full and detailed)
o Right-Arrow, Left-Arrow, Down-Arrow, Up-Arrow - move the
cursor.
o Ctrl+F, Ctrl+B, Ctrl+N, Ctrl+P - move the cursor.
o Ctrl+Right-Arrow, Ctrl+Left-Arrow, Ctrl+Down-Arrow,
Ctrl+Up-Arrow - move n times the cursor.
o Esc+Right-Arrow, Esc+Left-Arrow, Esc+Down-Arrow, Esc+Up-
Arrow - move n times the cursor.
o Esc+F, Esc+B, Esc+N, Esc+P - move n times the cursor.
o Home, Ctrl+A - go the beginning of the line.
o End, Ctrl+E - go to the end of the line.
o Page up, Esc+V, F5 - go up in the file by one page.
o Page down, Ctrl+V, F6 - go down in the file by one page.
o <, Esc+<, Esc+Home - go to the beginning of the file.
o >, Esc+>, Esc+End - go to the end of the file (for regular
files that have a size).
o Ctrl+Z - suspend hexedit.
o Ctrl+U, Ctrl+_, Ctrl+/ - undo all (forget the modifica-
tions).
o Ctrl+Q - read next input character and insert it (this is
useful for inserting control characters and bound keys).
o Tab, Ctrl+T - toggle between ASCII and hexadecimal.
o /, Ctrl+S - search forward (in ASCII or in hexadecimal,
use TAB to change).
o Ctrl+R - search backward.
o Ctrl+G, F4 - go to a position in the file.
o Return - go to a sector in the file if --sector is used,
otherwise go to a position in the file.
o Esc+L - display the page starting at the current cursor
position.
o F2, Ctrl+W - save the modifications.
o F1, Esc+H - help (show the man page).
o Ctrl+O, F3 - open another file
o Ctrl+L - redisplay (refresh) the display (usefull when
your terminal screws up).
o Backspace, Ctrl+H - undo the modifications made on the
previous byte.
o Esc+Ctrl+H - undo the modifications made on the previous
bytes.
o Ctrl+Space, F9 - set mark where cursor is.
o Esc+W, Delete, F7 - copy selected region.
o Ctrl+Y, Insert, F8 - paste (yank) previously copied
region.
o Esc+Y, F11 - save previously copied region to a file.
o Esc+I, F12 - fill the selection with a string
o Esc+T - truncate the file at the current location
o Ctrl+C - unconditional quit (without saving).
SunOS 5.11 Last change: 12 July 1998 2
User Commands HEXEDIT(1)
o F10, Ctrl+X - quit.
For the Esc commands, it sometimes works to use Alt instead
of Esc. Funny things here (especially for froggies :) egrave
= Alt+H , ccedilla = Alt+G, Alt+Y = ugrave.
Modeline
At the bottom of the display you have the modeline (copied
from emacs). As in emacs, you have the indications --, **
and %% meaning unmodified, modified and read-only. Then you
have the name of the file you're currently editing. Next to
it is the current position of the cursor in the file fol-
lowed by the total file size. The total file size isn't
quite correct for devices.
While in --sector mode, it shows the sector the cursor is
in.
Editing
You can edit in ASCII or in hexadecimal. You can switch
between the two with Tab. When the file is read-only, you
can't edit it. When trying to edit a read-only file, a mes-
sage (``File is read-only'') tells you it is non-writable.
The modifications are shown in bold until they are saved.
The modeline indicates whether you have modified the file or
not.
When editing in hexadecimal, only 0,1,...,9, a,b,...,f,
A,B,...F are legal. Other keys are unbound. The first time
you hit an unbound key, the help pops up. It won't pop
again unless you call the help directly (with F1).
When editing in ascii, you can find it difficult to enter
characters like / which are bound to a function. The solu-
tion is to use the quoted insert function Ctrl+Q, the key
after the quoted insert function is not processed by hexedit
(like emacs' quoted-insert, or like the \ character in C).
Searching
You can search for a string in ASCII or in hexadecimal. You
can switch between the two with Tab. If the string is found,
the cursor is moved to the beginning of the matching loca-
tion. If the search failed, a message (``not found'') tells
you so. You can cancel the search by pressing a key.
The search in hexadecimal is a bit confusing. You must give
a hexadecimal string with an even number of characters. The
search can then be done byte by byte. If you want to search
a long number (eg: a 32 bit number), you must know the
internal representation of that number (little/big endian
problem) and give it the way it is in memory. For example,
on an Intel processor (little endian), you must swap every
bytes: 0x12345678 is written 0x78563412 in memory and that's
the string you must give to the search engine.
Before searching you are asked if you want to save the
changes, if the file is edited.
SunOS 5.11 Last change: 12 July 1998 3
User Commands HEXEDIT(1)
For more sophisticated search, see Volker Schatz's patch at
<http://www.volkerschatz.com/unix/homebrew.html#hexedit>.
Selecting, copying, pasting, filling
First, select the part of the buffer you want to copy: start
setting the mark where you want. Then go to the end of the
area you want to copy (you can use the go to function and
the search functions). Then copy it. You can then paste the
copied area in the current file or in another file.
You can also fill the selected area with a string or a char-
acter: start choosing the block you want to fill in (set
mark then move to the end of the block), and call the fill
function (F12). hexedit ask you the string you want to fill
the block with.
The code is not tuned for huge filling as it keeps the modi-
fications in memory until you save them. That's why hexedit
will warn you if you try to fill in a big block.
When the mark is set, the selection is shown in reverse
mode.
Be aware that the copied area contains the modifications
done at the time of the copy. But if you undo the modifica-
tions, it does not change the content of the copy buffer. It
seems obvious but it's worth saying.
Scrolling
The scrolling is different whether you are in --sector mode
or not. In normal mode, the scrolling is line by line. In
sector mode, the scrolling is sector by sector. In both
modes, you can force the display to start at a given posi-
tion using Esc+L.
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following
attributes:
+---------------+------------------+
|ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
+---------------+------------------+
|Availability | editor/hexedit |
+---------------+------------------+
|Stability | Uncommited |
+---------------+------------------+
SEE ALSO
od(1), hdump(1), hexdump(1), bpe(1), hexed(1), beav(1).
AUTHOR
Pixel (Pascal Rigaux) <pixel@rigaux.org>,
Home page is <http://rigaux.org/>.
SunOS 5.11 Last change: 12 July 1998 4
User Commands HEXEDIT(1)
UNRESTRICTIONS
hexedit is Open Source; anyone may redistribute copies of
hexedit to anyone under the terms stated in the GNU General
Public License.
You can find hexedit at
<http://rigaux.org/hexedit-1.2.12.src.tgz> and
<http://rigaux.org/hexedit-1.2.12.bin.i386.dynamic.tgz>.
TODO
Anything you think could be nice...
LIMITATIONS
There are problems with the curses library given with Redhat
5.0 that make hexedit think the terminal is huge. The result
is that hexedit is not usable.
The shortcuts work on some machines, and not on others.
That's why there are many shortcuts for each function. The
Ctrl+Arrows and the Alt+. do not work work as they should
most of the time. On SUNs, you must do Ctrl+V-Ctrl+V instead
of Ctrl+V (!); and the Alt key is the diamond one.
While searching, it could be interesting to know which posi-
tion the search has reached. It's always nice to see some-
thing moving to help waiting.
The hexadecimal search could be able to search modulo 4 bits
instead of 8 bits. Another feature could be to complete
padd odd length hexadecimal searches with zeros.
BUGS
I have an example where the display is completly screwed up.
It seems to be a bug in ncurses (or maybe in xterm and
rxvt)?? Don't know if it's me using ncurses badly or not...
It seems to happen when hexedit leaves only one space at the
end of the lines... If anyone has a (or the) solution,
please tell me!
If you have any problem with the program (even a small one),
please do report it to me. Remarks of any kind are also wel-
come.
NOTES
This software was built from source available at
https://java.net/projects/solaris-userland. The original
community source was downloaded from
http://rigaux.org/hexedit-1.2.12.src.tgz
Further information about this software can be found on the
open source community website at http://merd.source-
forge.net/pixel/hexedit.html.
SunOS 5.11 Last change: 12 July 1998 5