strings - return the strings of printable characters in files
import strings
List strings.strings(String filename, Character encoding, Integer minimum_length, Boolean include_backspaces, Boolean include_whitespaces, String string_termination, Boolean scan_entire_file, String target, Integer file_offset, Integer file_length)
The strings function returns a list of (offset, printable strings) tuples contained in the filename file or the standard input stream if empty.
All the other parameters also have default values and thus are optional.
The encoding parameter sets the character encoding to be used while searching for strings. Valid values are:
- s for single 7-bit-byte characters (ASCII, ISO 8859). The default value.
- S for single 8-bit-byte characters.
- l for 16-bit little-endian.
- b for 16-bit big-endian.
- L for 32-bit little-endian.
- B for 32-bit big-endian.
- u for 1 to 4 bytes UTF-8 characters.
The minimum_length parameter defines the minimum number of contiguous characters in strings. The default value is 4.
If True, the include_backspaces parameter allows backspace characters in strings. The default value is False.
If True, the include_whitespaces parameter allows backspace, new line, vertical tab, form feed and carriage return characters in strings. The default value is False.
The string_termination parameter expects a comma separated string of the integer values of allowed string ending characters. The default value is a blank string, which means any unprintable character. It is common to use "0:10" to allow only null or new line characters, which is often relevant for binary and text files respectively.
If True, the scan_entire_file parameter sets a full file scan. The default value is False, though without any executable file formats supported (yet) it also falls back to a full scan.
The target parameter allows the selection of a specific executable file format (potentially different from the system's default), though none are currently supported. It must be set to "part" if you want to use the file_offset or file_length parameters. The default value is a blank string.
The file_offset parameter defines the number of bytes to skip from the beginning of the file to scan. The default value is 0.
The file_length parameter defines the number of bytes to read from the file_offset of the file to scan. The default value is all.
The STRINGS_DEBUG environment variable can be set to any value to enable debug mode.
The strings library tries to follow the PEP 8 style guide for Python code.
This library was made for the PNU project.
It is available under the 3-clause BSD license.
This library does not (yet) support any executable format (ELF, a.out, COFF, etc.). All executable files are entirely scanned regardless of the target parameter, with the exception of the "part" value.