GoRE - Package gore is a library for analyzing Go binaries

How to use

1. Use go get to download the library.
2. Import it into your project.
3. Write a new cool tool.

For an example use case, please check out redress.

Sample code

Extract the main package, child packages, and sibling packages:

f, err := gore.Open(fileStr)
pkgs, err := f.GetPackages()

Extract all the types in the binary:

f, err := gore.Open(fileStr)
typs, err := f.GetTypes()

Update get new Go release information

Instead of downloading a new library release for Go version detection, you can perform a local pull.

Run go generate and new compiler releases will be generated from the git tags.

Functionality

Go compiler

The library has functionality for guessing the compiler version used. It searches the binary for the identifiable string left by the compiler. It is not perfect, so functionality for assuming a specific version is also provided. The version strings used are identical to the identifiers. For example version "1.10.1" is represented as "go1.10.1" and version "1.10" is represented as "go1.10"

Function recovery

Function information is recovered from the pclntab. Information that is recovered includes: function start and end location in the text section, source file. The library also tries to estimate the first and last line number in the source file for the function. The methods recovered includes the receiver. All functions and methods belong to a package. The library tries to classify the type of package. If it is a standard library package, 3rd-party package, or part of the main application. If it unable to classify the package, it is classified as unknown.

Type recovery

The types in the binary are parsed from the "typelink" list. Not all versions of Go are supported equally. Versions 1.7 and later are fully supported. Versions 1.5 and 1.6 are partially supported. Version prior to 1.5 are not supported at all at the moment.

Licensing and Compatibility

License

Most of the gore library files are licensed under the BSD License. A few features, however, are licensed under AGPL (Affero General Public License). These features include:

• Extraction of GOROOT.

Using GORE under BSD license

It's possible to compile GORE with only the BSD code so it can be distributed under the BSD license. Compiling with the build tag gore_bsd will only enable BSD licensed code. The resulting binary can be distributed under any BSD compatible license.

Building a Go binary without this build tag will include the AGPL licensed code. This means the resulting binary must be licensed under AGPL too.