Libelf by Example
About the Book
This tutorial introduces libelf, a library implementing the ELF(3)/GELF(3) API for reading and writing object code in the Extensible Linking Format (ELF) file format.
The tutorial covers:
- Getting started with libelf: obtaining a handle to an ELF object, establishing a working ELF version, and handling errors reported by libelf.
- How ELF data structures are laid out in-memory and on disk, the notions of "file representation" and "memory representation", how to write applications that can handle non-native binaries.
- ELF Segments and the ELF Program Header Table, retrieving the program header table from an ELF executable and the meaning of the fields of a program header table entry.
- How data is stored inside ELF sections, the ELF Section Header Table, and how to traverse the sections in an ELF object.
- How to create new ELF objects: the rules for ordering individual API calls, the default object layout implemented by libelf, and how to specify custom layouts.
- ar archives: their structure, and how to read the contents of these archives using the APIs provided by libelf.
The code in this tutorial is written in the C programming language.
While written for the libelf implementation that is part of the Elftoolchain open-source project, this tutorial is expected to be compatible with other libelf implementations, such as that offered by the GNU project.
This 'source' for this tutorial is itself published under a liberal license; please see the Elftoolchain project's site.
About the Author
Table of Contents
- Preface
- 1. Introduction
- 1.1 Tutorial Overview
- 1.2 Tutorial Structure
- 2. Getting Started
- 2.1 Example: Getting started with libelf
- 3. Peering Inside an ELF Object
- 3.1 The Layout of an ELF file
- 3.2 Example: Reading an ELF executable header
- 4. Examining the Program Header Table
- 4.1 The ELF Program Header Table
- 4.2 Example: Reading a Program Header Table
- 5. Looking at Sections
- 5.1 ELF section handling with libelf
- 5.2 Example: Listing section names
- 6. Creating new ELF objects
- 6.1 Example: Creating an ELF object
- 6.2 The finer points in creating ELF objects
- 7. Processing ar(1) archives
- 7.1 Archive structure
- 7.2 Example: Stepping through an ar(1) archive
- 8. Conclusion
- 8.1 Further Reading
- 8.2 Getting Further Help
Causes Supported
Electronic Frontier Foundation
Defending your civil liberties in a digital world.
https://www.eff.org/Based in San Francisco, EFF is a donor-supported membership organization working to protect fundamental rights regardless of technology.
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