Idascript

Idascript

Idascript is a python library allowing to launch idapython script on binary files in a transparent manner.

Installation

Installing the library can be done with:

pip install idascript

After installation idascript should be ready for import and the script idascripter should be in the path to use the library as a program.

IDA path

idascript looks for the idat64 in the $PATH environment variable but if it is not present the IDA installation path should be given via the IDA_PATH environment variable.

Command line

export IDA_PATH=[your ida path]
idascripter ...

or

IDA_PATH=[your ida path] idascripter ...

Dependencies: The idascripter script requires libmagic to identify executable binaries. It should be available on the system. It can be installed with:

sudo apt install libmagic1

Python library

If IDA_PATH provided to the interpreter, it can be set manually with os.environ["IDA_PATH"] = [your path].

The easiest way is to export the environment variable in you bashrc

idascripter

After installation the script idascripter is available in the path. It helps executing idapython scripts on one or multiple binary files in an easy manner.

Single file

idascripter my_binary_file [-s my_script.py] [-t timeout] [my script params | IDA options]

idascripter returns the exit code of the IDA process, which can be itself the exit code of your script given by ida_pro.qexit(num).

As a recall an idapython script should be architectured like this:

import ida_auto
import ida_pro

ida_auto.auto_wait() # wait for the pre-analysis of IDA to be terminated

# Your script content

ida_pro.qexit(0) #exit IDA with the given return code (otherwise remains opened)

Disclaimer: You should make sure that the import of your script are satisfied (in python2) before luanching it against binaries

Multiple files

If idascripter is given a directory instead of a file, it will recursively iterate all the directory and subdirectories for executable files. The file type detection is based on magic library and analyse files which ave the following mime type: application/x-dosexec (PE, MS-DOS), application/x-sharedlib (ELF), application/x-mach-binary (Mach-O), application/x-executable (ELF).

When running idascripter shows a progessbar and keeps track of files having a return code other than 0 to (help post-analysis debug).

MultiIDA

Note: An optional parameters (-l/–log) can be precised to have a log file with all the results.

Library usage

The python library intents to be as simple as possible.

Single file analysis

A single file analysis can performed as follow:

os.environ["IDA_PATH"] = "/path/to/ida" # If not given to the interpreter directly
from idascript import IDA
ida = IDA("/path/binary", "/path/script", [])
ida.start()
retcode = ida.wait()

Note start is not blocking so you can come to pick up the result whenever you want.

Multiple file analysis

This works almost similarly to single file analysis except that a file iterator should be given. A simple usage is:

from idascript import MultiIDA, iter_binary_files
generator = iter_binary_files('/path/to/bins')
for (retcode, file) in MultiIDA.map(generator, "/path/script", []):
    # Do what you want with analysed files yielded

The generator should is not necessarily a generator, thus it can be a list of files to analyse

Custom file generator

We might be led to write our own file iterator depending on our needs. Let’s consider we want to analyse only files that have never been analysed namely the ones not having a .i64 associated. Thus, we can derive our own generator from iter_binary_files like this:

import os.path
from pathlib import Path
from idascript import MultiIDA, iter_binary_files

def my_custom_generator(path):
    for file in iter_binary_files(path):
        i64_file = os.path.splitext(file)[0]+".i64"
        if not Path(i64_file).exists():
            yield file

generator = my_custom_generator('/path/to/bins')
for (retcode, file) in MultiIDA.map(generator, "/path/script", []):
    # Do something with files

API

class idascript.ida.IDA(binary_file: Path | str, script_file: str | Path | None = None, script_params: List[str] | None = None, timeout: float | None = None, exit_virtualenv: bool = False)[source]

Bases: object

Class representing an IDA execution on a given file with a given script. This class is a wrapper to subprocess IDA.

Parameters:
  • binary_file – path of the binary file to analyse

  • script_file – path to the Python script to execute on the binary (if required)

  • script_params – additional parameters to send either to the script or IDA directly

  • exit_virtualenv – exit current virtual env before calling IDA

bin_file: Path

File to the binary

kill() None[source]

Call kill on the IDA subprocess (kill -9)

params: List[str]

list of paramaters given to IDA

property pid: int

Returns the PID of the IDA process

Returns:

int (PID of the process)

property returncode: int | None

Get the returncode of the process. Raise IDANotStart if called before launching the process.

script_file: Path | None

script file to execute

start() None[source]

Start the IDA process on the binary.

terminate() None[source]

Call terminate on the IDA process (kill -15)

property terminated: bool

Boolean function returning True if the process is terminated

timeout: float | None

Timeout for IDA execution

wait() int[source]

Wait for the process to finish. This function hangs until the process terminate. A timeout can be given which raises TimeoutExpired if the timeout is exceeded (subprocess mechanism).

exception idascript.ida.IDAException[source]

Bases: Exception

Base class for exceptions in the module.

exception idascript.ida.IDAModeNotSet[source]

Bases: IDAException

This exception is raised when the IDA Mode has not been set before calling start.

exception idascript.ida.IDANotStared[source]

Bases: IDAException

This exception is raised when attempting to call a function of the IDA class before having called start.

class idascript.ida.MultiIDA[source]

Bases: object

Class to trigger multiple IDA processes concurrently on a bunch of files.

static map(generator: Iterable[Path], script: str | Path | None = None, params: List[str] | None = None, workers: int | None = None, timeout: float | None = None, exit_virtualenv: bool = False) Generator[tuple[int, Path], None, None][source]

Iterator the generator sent and apply the script file on each file concurrently on a bunch of IDA workers. The function consume the generator as fast as it can occupy all the workers and yield a tuple (return code, path file) everytime an IDA process as terminated.

Parameters:
  • generator – Iterable of file paths strings (or Path)

  • script – path to the script to execute

  • params – list of parameters to send to the script

  • workers – number of workers to trigger in parallel

  • timeout – timeout for IDA runs (-1 means infinity)

  • exit_virtualenv – exit current virtualenv before calling IDA

Returns:

generator of files processed (return code, file path)

exception idascript.ida.MultiIDAAlreadyRunning[source]

Bases: IDAException

Exception raised if the map function of MultiIDA is called while another map operation is still pending. Design choices disallow launching two MultiIDA.map function in the same time.