1HEXEDIT(1) General Commands Manual HEXEDIT(1)
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6 hexedit - view and edit files in hexadecimal or in ASCII
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9 hexedit [-s | --sector] [-m | --maximize] [-h | --help] [filename]
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12 hexedit shows a file both in ASCII and in hexadecimal. The file can be
13 a device as the file is read a piece at a time. You can modify the file
14 and search through it.
15
17 -s, --sector
18 Format the display to have entire sectors.
19 -m, --maximize
21 Try to maximize the display.
22 --color
24 Display colors. This feature is only available if your operat‐
25 ing system supports it.
26 -h, --help
28 Show the usage.
29
31 Moving
32 <, > : go to start/end of the file
33 Right: next character
34 Left: previous character
35 Down: next line
36 Up: previous line
37 Home: beginning of line
38 End: end of line
39 PUp: page forward
40 PDown: page backward
41 Miscellaneous
43 F2: save
44 F3: load file
45 F1: help
46 Ctrl-L: redraw
47 Ctrl-Z: suspend
48 Ctrl-X: save and exit
49 Ctrl-C: exit without saving
50 Tab: toggle hex/ascii
52 Return: go to
53 Backspace: undo previous character
54 Ctrl-U: undo all
55 Ctrl-S: search forward
56 Ctrl-R: search backward
57 Cut&Paste
59 Ctrl-Space: set mark
60 Esc-W: copy
61 Ctrl-Y: paste
62 Esc-Y: paste into a file
63 Esc-I: fill
64
66 o Right-Arrow, Left-Arrow, Down-Arrow, Up-Arrow - move the cursor.
67 o Ctrl+F, Ctrl+B, Ctrl+N, Ctrl+P - move the cursor.
68 o Ctrl+Right-Arrow, Ctrl+Left-Arrow, Ctrl+Down-Arrow, Ctrl+Up-Arrow -
69 move n times the cursor.
70 o Esc+Right-Arrow, Esc+Left-Arrow, Esc+Down-Arrow, Esc+Up-Arrow - move
71 n times the cursor.
72 o Esc+F, Esc+B, Esc+N, Esc+P - move n times the cursor.
73 o Home, Ctrl+A - go the beginning of the line.
74 o End, Ctrl+E - go to the end of the line.
75 o Page up, Esc+V, F5 - go up in the file by one page.
76 o Page down, Ctrl+V, F6 - go down in the file by one page.
77 o <, Esc+<, Esc+Home - go to the beginning of the file.
78 o >, Esc+>, Esc+End - go to the end of the file (for regular files that
79 have a size).
80 o Ctrl+Z - suspend hexedit.
81 o Ctrl+U, Ctrl+_, Ctrl+/ - undo all (forget the modifications).
82 o Ctrl+Q - read next input character and insert it (this is useful for
83 inserting control characters and bound keys).
84 o Tab, Ctrl+T - toggle between ASCII and hexadecimal.
85 o /, Ctrl+S - search forward (in ASCII or in hexadecimal, use TAB to
86 change).
87 o Ctrl+R - search backward.
88 o Ctrl+G, F4 - go to a position in the file.
89 o Return - go to a sector in the file if --sector is used, otherwise go
90 to a position in the file.
91 o Esc+L - display the page starting at the current cursor position.
92 o F2, Ctrl+W - save the modifications.
93 o F1, Esc+H - help (show the man page).
94 o Ctrl+O, F3 - open another file
95 o Ctrl+L - redisplay (refresh) the display (usefull when your terminal
96 screws up).
97 o Backspace, Ctrl+H - undo the modifications made on the previous byte.
98 o Esc+Ctrl+H - undo the modifications made on the previous bytes.
99 o Ctrl+Space, F9 - set mark where cursor is.
100 o Esc+W, Delete, F7 - copy selected region.
101 o Ctrl+Y, Insert, F8 - paste (yank) previously copied region.
102 o Esc+Y, F11 - save previously copied region to a file.
103 o Esc+I, F12 - fill the selection with a string
104 o Esc+T - truncate the file at the current location
105 o Ctrl+C - unconditional quit (without saving).
106 o F10, Ctrl+X - quit.
107 For the Esc commands, it sometimes works to use Alt instead of Esc.
109 Funny things here (especially for froggies :) egrave = Alt+H , ccedilla
110 = Alt+G, Alt+Y = ugrave.
111 Modeline
113 At the bottom of the display you have the modeline (copied from emacs).
114 As in emacs, you have the indications --, ** and %% meaning unmodified,
115 modified and read-only. Then you have the name of the file you're cur‐
116 rently editing. Next to it is the current position of the cursor in the
117 file followed by the total file size. The total file size isn't quite
118 correct for devices.
119 While in --sector mode, it shows the sector the cursor is in.
120 Editing
122 You can edit in ASCII or in hexadecimal. You can switch between the two
123 with Tab. When the file is read-only, you can't edit it. When trying to
124 edit a read-only file, a message (``File is read-only'') tells you it
125 is non-writable.
126 The modifications are shown in bold until they are saved. The modeline
127 indicates whether you have modified the file or not.
128 When editing in hexadecimal, only 0,1,...,9, a,b,...,f, A,B,...F are
129 legal. Other keys are unbound. The first time you hit an unbound key,
130 the help pops up. It won't pop again unless you call the help directly
131 (with F1).
132 When editing in ascii, you can find it difficult to enter characters
133 like / which are bound to a function. The solution is to use the quoted
134 insert function Ctrl+Q, the key after the quoted insert function is not
135 processed by hexedit (like emacs' quoted-insert, or like the \ charac‐
136 ter in C).
137 Searching
139 You can search for a string in ASCII or in hexadecimal. You can switch
140 between the two with Tab. If the string is found, the cursor is moved
141 to the beginning of the matching location. If the search failed, a mes‐
142 sage (``not found'') tells you so. You can cancel the search by press‐
143 ing a key.
144 The search in hexadecimal is a bit confusing. You must give a hexadeci‐
145 mal string with an even number of characters. The search can then be
146 done byte by byte. If you want to search a long number (eg: a 32 bit
147 number), you must know the internal representation of that number (lit‐
148 tle/big endian problem) and give it the way it is in memory. For exam‐
149 ple, on an Intel processor (little endian), you must swap every bytes:
150 0x12345678 is written 0x78563412 in memory and that's the string you
151 must give to the search engine.
152 Before searching you are asked if you want to save the changes, if the
153 file is edited.
154 For more sophisticated search, see Volker Schatz's patch at
156 <http://www.volkerschatz.com/unix/homebrew.html#hexedit>.
157 Selecting, copying, pasting, filling
159 First, select the part of the buffer you want to copy: start setting
160 the mark where you want. Then go to the end of the area you want to
161 copy (you can use the go to function and the search functions). Then
162 copy it. You can then paste the copied area in the current file or in
163 another file.
164 You can also fill the selected area with a string or a character: start
166 choosing the block you want to fill in (set mark then move to the end
167 of the block), and call the fill function (F12). hexedit ask you the
168 string you want to fill the block with.
169 The code is not tuned for huge filling as it keeps the modifications in
170 memory until you save them. That's why hexedit will warn you if you try
171 to fill in a big block.
172 When the mark is set, the selection is shown in reverse mode.
174 Be aware that the copied area contains the modifications done at the
175 time of the copy. But if you undo the modifications, it does not change
176 the content of the copy buffer. It seems obvious but it's worth saying.
177 Scrolling
179 The scrolling is different whether you are in --sector mode or not. In
180 normal mode, the scrolling is line by line. In sector mode, the
181 scrolling is sector by sector. In both modes, you can force the display
182 to start at a given position using Esc+L.
183
185 od(1), hdump(1), hexdump(1), bpe(1), hexed(1), beav(1).
186
188 Pixel (Pascal Rigaux) <pixel@rigaux.org>,
189 Home page is <http://rigaux.org/>.
190
192 hexedit is Open Source; anyone may redistribute copies of hexedit to
193 anyone under the terms stated in the GNU General Public License.
194 You can find hexedit at
196 <http://rigaux.org/hexedit-1.2.13.src.tgz> and
197 <http://rigaux.org/hexedit-1.2.13.bin.i386.dynamic.tgz>.
198
200 Anything you think could be nice...
201
203 There are problems with the curses library given with Redhat 5.0 that
204 make hexedit think the terminal is huge. The result is that hexedit is
205 not usable.
206 The shortcuts work on some machines, and not on others. That's why
208 there are many shortcuts for each function. The Ctrl+Arrows and the
209 Alt+. do not work work as they should most of the time. On SUNs, you
210 must do Ctrl+V-Ctrl+V instead of Ctrl+V (!); and the Alt key is the
211 diamond one.
212 While searching, it could be interesting to know which position the
214 search has reached. It's always nice to see something moving to help
215 waiting.
216 The hexadecimal search could be able to search modulo 4 bits instead of
218 8 bits. Another feature could be to complete padd odd length hexadeci‐
219 mal searches with zeros.
220
222 I have an example where the display is completly screwed up. It seems
223 to be a bug in ncurses (or maybe in xterm and rxvt)?? Don't know if
224 it's me using ncurses badly or not... It seems to happen when hexedit
225 leaves only one space at the end of the lines... If anyone has a (or
226 the) solution, please tell me!
227 If you have any problem with the program (even a small one), please do
229 report it to me. Remarks of any kind are also welcome.
230 12 July 1998 HEXEDIT(1)