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View Full Version : [New Tool] Portable Reverse Engineering Framework


ZaiRoN
June 14th, 2014, 05:42
There's a new tool made by Dax, it's called Portable Reverse Engineering Framework (or Pref if you prefer).

From the author:
"PREF is a software written in C++ using QT Framework that helps binary file analysis: it can analyze and display File Formats’ Structures, calculate Entropy, show Histograms, search Strings, and provide power Instruction Disassembler Engine (not ready yet), and much more!
PREF uses Lua for its scripts, in this way the user can create custom scripts and adapt the software in the way he/she likes."


You can read more about it at dax89.comlu.com

2931

_genuine
June 17th, 2014, 14:01
I took a quick look and didnt see a binary. Is this tool supposed to be compiled from the github repo? or does the author provide a compiled binary? Just wanna know so when I get home I'll know how much time to commit.

ZaiRoN
June 17th, 2014, 15:26
There's a precompiled binary for 0.9.1 version. The latest release, 0.9.5, is only available via Github right now; but the binary should be up sooner. This is what I read from his web page.

bilbo
June 18th, 2014, 07:13
Well,
I couldn't wait and I compiled it using VisualStudio2010 and an hand-crafted QT static lib. After some work (due to the fact that the author uses GCC and does not support MSVC - but I want MSVC because the debugger is unbeatable) I obtained a truly portable executable, rather buggy yet.
I was initially excited because the interface is nice, it is Open Source, it uses QT which I love, it handles signatures through SQlite. But my excitement was soon softened when I realized that a lot of work must yet be done: currently the only assembly Language / executable format supported is PSX. And every new format/Language must be added through plug-in mechanism but using LUA, which interacts with PREF APIs through Lua FFI (Foreign Functions Interface).
If you are curios about these modules, which are the heart of PREF, you will find them in PREFSDK repository.
I do not agree very much with the Lua choice, and I eventually prefer to spend my time on RADARE2 (a much more complete RE framework), but I nevertheless wish a great success for PREF and appreciate the great courage of its author, the italian student Antonio Trogu.

Best regards
bilbo

ZaiRoN
June 18th, 2014, 16:27
Too bad... I have to admit I didn't try PREF, I've been intrigued by the same things you listed. I hope to see a more complete framework for the future updates.