Forensicshexeditorfileeditordiskeditorncursesbinaryasciiebcdic

ncurses-hexedit

ncurses-hexedit is a curses-based hex editor for viewing and editing files or disks in hexadecimal, ASCII, or EBCDIC formats. It supports insert, delete, search, undo, and disk editing capabilities.

Description

Hexedit allows editing and viewing files in hexadecimal along with their ASCII or EBCDIC text equivalents. Standard editing features include insert, delete, search for text or bytes, highlighted changes, undo, two viewing formats, and full-screen text snapshots. It also permits editing of fixed disks and includes a binary/octal/decimal/hex converter.

This tool is useful for low-level file manipulation, reverse engineering binaries, forensic analysis of disk images, or examining raw data structures. The full-screen curses interface provides an intuitive way to navigate and modify hex data without leaving the terminal.

As part of Kali Linux tools, ncurses-hexedit (also referred to as hexeditor) is packaged for easy installation and depends on libraries like libc6, libncurses6, libtinfo6, and hexeditor.

How It Works

ncurses-hexedit operates as a full-screen curses-based interface, rendering hexadecimal data alongside ASCII or EBCDIC representations. It buffers files in memory when specified for faster insert/delete operations, supports read-only disk editing by default, and requires force flag for writes. Searches scan for text or byte sequences, with changes highlighted and undo functionality tracking modifications. Viewing modes switch between formats, and a converter handles numeric base transformations.

Installation

bash

sudo apt install ncurses-hexedit

Flags

-h, --helpPrint this message and exit.

-8, --highbitPrint high order 8-bit text.

-a, --alltextPrint all text characters.

-b, --bufferBuffer the entire file in memory. Much faster and enables insert/delete.

-d, --diskEdit a fixed disk, i.e. /dev/hda (Read-only)

-f, --forceForce editing of disk. Needed to write to disks.

Examples

Display the help message and usage information for the tool.

hexeditor -h

Open and edit a binary file in hex, ASCII, and EBCDIC views with standard editing features.

hexeditor file.bin

Buffer the entire file in memory for faster editing, enabling insert and delete operations.

hexeditor -b largefile.img

Edit a fixed disk in read-only mode, such as /dev/hda or /dev/sda.

hexeditor -d /dev/sda

Force editing of a disk to allow write operations.

hexeditor -f -d /dev/sda

Edit a file while printing all text characters in the display.

hexeditor -a file.dat

Buffer file in memory, print high order 8-bit text for extended character viewing.

hexeditor -8 -b file.hex

Updated 2026-04-16kali.org ↗