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- .TH XXD 1 "August 1996" "Manual page for xxd"
- .\"
- .\" 21st May 1996
- .\" Man page author:
- .\" Tony Nugent <tony@sctnugen.ppp.gu.edu.au> <T.Nugent@sct.gu.edu.au>
- .\" Changes by Bram Moolenaar <Bram@vim.org>
- .SH NAME
- .I xxd
- \- make a hexdump or do the reverse.
- .SH SYNOPSIS
- .B xxd
- \-h[elp]
- .br
- .B xxd
- [options] [infile [outfile]]
- .br
- .B xxd
- \-r[evert] [options] [infile [outfile]]
- .SH DESCRIPTION
- .I xxd
- creates a hex dump of a given file or standard input.
- It can also convert a hex dump back to its original binary form.
- Like
- .BR uuencode(1)
- and
- .BR uudecode(1)
- it allows the transmission of binary data in a `mail-safe' ASCII representation,
- but has the advantage of decoding to standard output.
- Moreover, it can be used to perform binary file patching.
- .SH OPTIONS
- If no
- .I infile
- is given, standard input is read.
- If
- .I infile
- is specified as a
- .RB \` \- \'
- character, then input is taken from standard input.
- If no
- .I outfile
- is given (or a
- .RB \` \- \'
- character is in its place), results are sent to standard output.
- .PP
- Note that a "lazy" parser is used which does not check for more than the first
- option letter, unless the option is followed by a parameter.
- Spaces between a single option letter and its parameter are optional.
- Parameters to options can be specified in decimal, hexadecimal or octal
- notation.
- .RB Thus \-c8 ,
- .BR "\-c 8" ,
- .B \-c 010
- and
- .B \-cols 8
- are all equivalent.
- .PP
- .TP
- .IR \-a " | " \-autoskip
- toggle autoskip: A single '*' replaces nul-lines. Default off.
- .TP
- .IR \-b " | " \-bits
- Switch to bits (binary digits) dump, rather than hexdump.
- This option writes octets as eight digits "1"s and "0"s instead of a normal
- hexacecimal dump. Each line is preceded by a line number in hexadecimal and
- followed by an ascii (or ebcdic) representation. The command line switches
- \-r, \-p, \-i do not work with this mode.
- .TP
- .IR "\-c cols " | " \-cols cols"
- .IR "\-c cols " | " \-cols cols"
- format
- .RI < cols >
- octets per line. Default 16 (\-i: 12, \-ps: 30, \-b: 6). Max 256.
- .TP
- .IR \-E " | " \-EBCDIC
- Change the character encoding in the righthand column from ASCII to EBCDIC.
- This does not change the hexadecimal representation. The option is
- meaningless in combinations with \-r, \-p or \-i.
- .TP
- .IR "\-g bytes " | " \-groupsize bytes"
- seperate the output of every
- .RI < bytes >
- bytes (two hex characters or eight bit-digits each) by a whitespace.
- Specify
- .I \-g 0
- to suppress grouping.
- .RI < Bytes "> defaults to " 2
- in normal mode and \fI1\fP in bits mode.
- Grouping does not apply to postscript or include style.
- .TP
- .IR \-h " | " \-help
- print a summary of available commands and exit. No hex dumping is performed.
- .TP
- .IR \-i " | " \-include
- output in C include file style. A complete static array definition is written
- (named after the input file), unless xxd reads from stdin.
- .TP
- .IR "\-l len " | " \-len len"
- stop after writing
- .RI < len >
- octets.
- .TP
- .IR \-p " | " \-ps " | " \-postscript " | " \-plain
- output in postscript continuous hexdump style. Also known as plain hexdump
- style.
- .TP
- .IR \-r " | " \-revert
- reverse operation: convert (or patch) hexdump into binary.
- If not writing to stdout, xxd writes into its output file without truncating
- it. Use the combination
- .I \-r \-p
- to read plain hexadecimal dumps without line number information and without a
- particular column layout. Additional Whitespace and line-breaks are allowed
- anywhere.
- .TP
- .I \-seek offset
- When used after
- .I \-r
- : revert with
- .RI < offset >
- added to file positions found in hexdump.
- .TP
- .I \-s [\+][\-]seek
- start at
- .RI < seek >
- bytes abs. (or rel.) infile offset.
- \fI\+ \fRindicates that the seek is relative to the current stdin file position
- (meaningless when not reading from stdin). \fI\- \fRindicates that the seek
- should be that many characters from the end of the input (or if combined with
- \fI \+ \fR: before the current stdin file position).
- Without \-s option, xxd starts at the current file position.
- .TP
- .I \-u
- use upper case hex letters. Default is lower case.
- .TP
- .IR \-v " | " \-version
- show version string.
- .SH CAVEATS
- .PP
- .I xxd \-r
- has some builtin magic while evaluating line number information.
- If the ouput file is seekable, then the linenumbers at the start of each
- hexdump line may be out of order, lines may be missing, or overlapping. In
- these cases xxd will lseek(2) to the next position. If the output file is not
- seekable, only gaps are allowed, which will be filled by null-bytes.
- .PP
- .I xxd \-r
- never generates parse errors. Garbage is silently skipped.
- .PP
- When editing hexdumps, please note that
- .I xxd \-r
- skips everything on the input line after reading enough columns of hexadecimal
- data (see option \-c). This also means, that changes to the printable ascii (or
- ebcdic) columns are always ignored. Reverting a plain (or postscript) style
- hexdump with xxd \-r \-p does not depend on the correct number of columns. Here an thing that looks like a pair of hex-digits is interpreted.
- .PP
- Note the difference between
- .br
- \fI% xxd \-i file\fR
- .br
- and
- .br
- \fI% xxd \-i \< file\fR
- .PP
- .I xxd \-s \+seek
- may be different from
- .I xxd \-s seek
- , as lseek(2) is used to "rewind" input. A '+'
- makes a difference if the input source is stdin, and if stdin's file position
- is not at the start of the file by the time xxd is started and given its input.
- The following examples may help to clarify (or further confuse!)...
- .PP
- Rewind stdin before reading; needed because the `cat' has already read to the
- end of stdin.
- .br
- \fI% sh \-c 'cat > plain_copy; xxd \-s 0 > hex_copy' < file
- .PP
- Hexdump from file position 0x480 (=1024+128) onwards.
- The `+' sign means "relative to the current position", thus the `128' adds to
- the 1k where dd left off.
- .br
- \fI% sh \-c 'dd of=plain_snippet bs=1k count=1; xxd \-s +128 > hex_snippet' < file
- .PP
- Hexdump from file position 0x100 ( = 1024-768) on.
- .br
- \fI% sh \-c 'dd of=plain_snippet bs=1k count=1; xxd \-s +-768 > hex_snippet' < file
- .PP
- However, this is a rare situation and the use of `+' is rarely needed.
- the author prefers to monitor the effect of xxd with strace(1) or truss(1), whenever \-s is used.
- .SH EXAMPLES
- .PP
- .br
- Print everything but the first three lines (hex 0x30 bytes) of
- .B file
- \.
- .br
- \fI% xxd \-s 0x30 file
- .PP
- .br
- Print 3 lines (hex 0x30 bytes) from the end of
- .B file
- \.
- .br
- \fI% xxd \-s \-0x30 file
- .PP
- .br
- Print 120 bytes as continuous hexdump with 40 octets per line.
- .br
- \fI% xxd \-l 120 \-ps \-c 20 xxd.1\fR
- .br
- 2e544820585844203120224d616e75616c207061
- .br
- 676520666f7220787864220a2e5c220a2e5c2220
- .br
- 32317374204d617920313939360a2e5c22204d61
- .br
- 6e207061676520617574686f723a0a2e5c222020
- .br
- 2020546f6e79204e7567656e74203c746f6e7940
- .br
- 7363746e7567656e2e7070702e67752e6564752e
- .br
-
- .br
- Hexdump the first 120 bytes of this man page with 12 octets per line.
- .br
- \fI% xxd \-l 120 \-c 12 xxd.1\fR
- .br
- 0000000: 2e54 4820 5858 4420 3120 224d .TH XXD 1 "M
- .br
- 000000c: 616e 7561 6c20 7061 6765 2066 anual page f
- .br
- 0000018: 6f72 2078 7864 220a 2e5c 220a or xxd"..\\".
- .br
- 0000024: 2e5c 2220 3231 7374 204d 6179 .\\" 21st May
- .br
- 0000030: 2031 3939 360a 2e5c 2220 4d61 1996..\\" Ma
- .br
- 000003c: 6e20 7061 6765 2061 7574 686f n page autho
- .br
- 0000048: 723a 0a2e 5c22 2020 2020 546f r:..\\" To
- .br
- 0000054: 6e79 204e 7567 656e 7420 3c74 ny Nugent <t
- .br
- 0000060: 6f6e 7940 7363 746e 7567 656e ony@sctnugen
- .br
- 000006c: 2e70 7070 2e67 752e 6564 752e .ppp.gu.edu.
- .PP
- .br
- Display just the date from the file xxd.1
- .br
- \fI% xxd \-s 0x28 \-l 12 \-c 12 xxd.1\fR
- .br
- 0000028: 3231 7374 204d 6179 2031 3939 21st May 199
- .PP
- .br
- Copy
- .B input_file
- to
- .B output_file
- and prepend 100 bytes of value 0x00.
- .br
- \fI% xxd input_file | xxd \-r \-s 100 \> output_file\fR
- .br
-
- .br
- Patch the date in the file xxd.1
- .br
- \fI% echo '0000029: 3574 68' | xxd \-r \- xxd.1\fR
- .br
- \fI% xxd \-s 0x28 \-l 12 \-c 12 xxd.1\fR
- .br
- 0000028: 3235 7468 204d 6179 2031 3939 25th May 199
- .PP
- .br
- Create a 65537 byte file with all bytes 0x00,
- except for the last one which is 'A' (hex 0x41).
- .br
- \fI% echo \'010000: 41\' | xxd \-r \> file\fR
- .PP
- .br
- Hexdump this file with autoskip.
- .br
- \fI% xxd \-a \-c 12 file\fR
- .br
- 0000000: 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 ............
- .br
- *
- .br
- 000fffc: 0000 0000 40 ....A
- .PP
- Create a 1 byte file containing a single 'A' character.
- The number after '\-r \-s' adds to the linenumbers found in the file;
- in effect, the leading bytes are suppressed.
- .br
- \fI% echo '010000: 41' | xxd \-r \-s \-0x10000 \> file\fR
- .PP
- Use xxd as a filter within an editor such as
- .B vim(1)
- to hexdump a region marked between `a' and `z'.
- .br
- \fI:'a,'z!xxd\fR
- .PP
- Use xxd as a filter within an editor such as
- .B vim(1)
- to recover a binary hexdump marked between `a' and `z'.
- .br
- \fI:'a,'z!xxd \-r\fR
- .PP
- Use xxd as a filter within an editor such as
- .B vim(1)
- to recover one line of a hexdump. Move the cursor over the line and type:
- .br
- \fI!!xxd \-r\fR
- .PP
- Read single characters from a serial line
- .br
- \fI% xxd \-c1 < /dev/term/b &\fR
- .br
- \fI% stty < /dev/term/b \-echo \-opost \-isig \-icanon min 1\fR
- .br
- \fI% echo \-n foo > /dev/term/b\fR
- .PP
- .SH "RETURN VALUES"
- The following error values are returned:
- .TP
- 0
- no errors encountered.
- .TP
- \-1
- operation not supported (
- .I xxd \-r \-i
- still impossible).
- .TP
- 1
- error while parsing options.
- .TP
- 2
- problems with input file.
- .TP
- 3
- problems with output file.
- .TP
- 4,5
- desired seek position is unreachable.
- .SH "SEE ALSO"
- uuencode(1), uudecode(1), patch(1)
- .br
- .SH WARNINGS
- The tools weirdness matches its creators brain.
- Use entirely at your own risk. Copy files. Trace it. Become a wizard.
- .br
- .SH VERSION
- This manual page documents xxd version 1.7
- .SH AUTHOR
- .br
- (c) 1990-1997 by Juergen Weigert
- .br
- <jnweiger@informatik.uni-erlangen.de>
- .LP
- Distribute freely and credit me,
- .br
- make money and share with me,
- .br
- lose money and don't ask me.
- .PP
- Manual page started by Tony Nugent
- .br
- <tony@sctnugen.ppp.gu.edu.au> <T.Nugent@sct.gu.edu.au>
- .br
- Small changes by Bram Moolenaar.
- Edited by Juergen Weigert.
- .PP
-