Quick Start Guide

Quick Start Guide

The five-minute path from clone to first extraction. For full detail see the Setup Guide and Usage Guide.

1. Get the tool

git clone https://github.com/Sandler73/RE-Unpacker.git
cd re-unpacker
chmod +x re-unpacker
./re-unpacker --version

On Windows, use .\re-unpacker.ps1 --version (PowerShell) or re-unpacker.cmd --version (cmd.exe). You need Python 3.10 or newer on PATH.

2. Check your tools

./re-unpacker --tools-check

This prints which extraction binaries are present and how to install the ones that are missing. Missing tools are not fatal: RE-Unpacker filters out the extractors it cannot run and continues with the rest.

3. Install the tools (optional but recommended)

# Linux (drives apt; needs root):
sudo ./re-unpacker --install --yes

# Windows (drives winget plus manual-install handlers; run elevated):
.\re-unpacker.ps1 --install --yes

4. Unpack something

# A single file.
./re-unpacker ./sample.deb

# A whole directory, with 4 workers and an explicit output root.
./re-unpacker ./samples -o ./out -j 4

5. Read the results

The run writes to the output root:

• manifest.json -- the consolidated, machine-readable record (schema 1.1.0).
• manifest.jsonl -- one JSON record per line, friendly to jq.
• summary.txt -- stats, top kinds, largest files, error summary.
• tree.txt -- a listing of the extracted tree.
• extracted/ -- the extracted content; every RE-Unpacker directory ends in .unpacked.

# List every extracted ELF.
jq -c 'select(.record_type == "file" and .kind == "ELF") | .path' out/manifest.jsonl

Next steps

• Classify without extracting: ./re-unpacker --dry-run ./samples
• Tune safety limits and features: see the Usage Guide.
• Hit a problem? See the Troubleshooting Guide.