6.4 KiB
fq
Tool, language and decoders for working with binary data.
fq is inspired by the well known jq tool and language and allows you to work with binary formats the same way you would using jq. In addition it can also present data similar to a hex viewer, transform, slice and concatenate binary data, supports nested formats and has an interactive REPL with auto-completion.
It was originally designed to query, inspect and debug codecs and metadata in media files and containers like mp4, flac, mp3, jpeg. But has since been extended to support a variety of formats like executables, packet captures including TCP reassembly and serialization formats like ASN1 BER, Avro, CBOR, protobuf and a lot more.
In summary it aims to be something like jq, hexdump, dd and gdb combined into one.
NOTE: fq is still early in development so things might change, be broken or do not make sense. That also means that there is a great opportunity to help out!
Name
The "f" in fq originate from file(1) and format in FFmpeg terminology. I pronounce jq /‘dʒei’kju:/ so I usually pronounce fq /‘ef’kju:/.
Goals
- Make binaries accessible, queryable and sliceable.
- Nested formats and bit-oriented decoding.
- Quick and comfortable CLI tool.
- Bits and bytes transformations.
Hopes
- Make it useful enough that people want to help improve it.
- Inspire people to create similar tools.
Supported formats
aac_frame, adts, adts_frame, apev2, ar, asn1_ber, av1_ccr, av1_frame, av1_obu, avc_annexb, avc_au, avc_dcr, avc_nalu, avc_pps, avc_sei, avc_sps, avro_ocf, bencode, bsd_loopback_frame, bson, bzip2, cbor, dns, dns_tcp, elf, ether8023_frame, exif, flac, flac_frame, flac_metadatablock, flac_metadatablocks, flac_picture, flac_streaminfo, gif, gzip, hevc_annexb, hevc_au, hevc_dcr, hevc_nalu, icc_profile, icmp, id3v1, id3v11, id3v2, ipv4_packet, jpeg, json, macho, matroska, mp3, mp3_frame, mp4, mpeg_asc, mpeg_es, mpeg_pes, mpeg_pes_packet, mpeg_spu, mpeg_ts, msgpack, ogg, ogg_page, opus_packet, pcap, pcapng, png, protobuf, protobuf_widevine, pssh_playready, raw, sll2_packet, sll_packet, tar, tcp_segment, tiff, udp_datagram, vorbis_comment, vorbis_packet, vp8_frame, vp9_cfm, vp9_frame, vpx_ccr, wav, webp, xing, zip
For details see formats.md
Usage
Basic usage is fq . file
.
For details see usage.md
Presentations
- "fq - jq for binary formats" at Binary Tools Summit 2022 - video slides
Install
Use one of the methods listed below or download release for your platform. Unarchive it and move the executable to PATH
etc.
On macOS if you don't install using a method below you might have to manually allow the binary to run. This can be done by trying to run the binary, ignore the warning and then go into security preference and allow it. Or you can run this command:
xattr -d com.apple.quarantine fq && spctl --add fq
Homebrew
# install latest release
brew install wader/tap/fq
Windows
fq
can be installed via scoop.
scoop install fq
Arch Linux
fq
can be installed from the community repository using pacman:
pacman -S fq
You can also build and install the development (VCS) package using an AUR helper:
paru -S fq-git
Nix
nix-shell -p fq
FreeBSD
Use the fq port.
Alpine
Currently in edge testing but should work fine in stable also.
apk add -X http://dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org/alpine/edge/testing fq
Build from source
Make sure you have go 1.17 or later installed.
To install directly from git repository do:
# build and install latest release
go install github.com/wader/fq@latest
# or build and install latest master
go install github.com/wader/fq@master
# copy binary to $PATH if needed
cp "$(go env GOPATH)/bin/fq" /usr/local/bin
To run and run tests from source directory:
# run all tests and build binary
make test fq
# it's also possible to use go run
go run fq.go
TODO and ideas
See TODO.md
Development and adding a new decoder
See dev.md
Thanks and related projects
This project would not have been possible without itchyny's jq implementation gojq. I also want to thank HexFiend for inspiration and ideas and stedolan for inventing the jq language.
Similar or related projects
- HexFiend
- binspector
- kaitai
- Wireshark (specially
tshark -T json
) - MediaInfo (specially
mediainfo --Output=JSON
andmediainfo --Details=1
) - GNU poke
- ffmpeg/ffprobe
- hexdump
License
fq
is distributed under the terms of the MIT License.
See the LICENSE file for license details.
Licenses of direct dependencies:
- Forked version of gojq https://github.com/itchyny/gojq/blob/main/LICENSE (MIT)
- Forked version of readline https://github.com/chzyer/readline/blob/master/LICENSE (MIT)
- gopacket https://github.com/google/gopacket/blob/master/LICENSE (BSD)
- mapstructure https://github.com/mitchellh/mapstructure/blob/master/LICENSE (MIT)
- go-difflib https://github.com/pmezard/go-difflib/blob/master/LICENSE (BSD)
- golang/x/text https://github.com/golang/text/blob/master/LICENSE (BSD)
- golang/snappy https://github.com/golang/snappy/blob/master/LICENSE (BSD)