Didier Stevens

This new version of the generic frame extraction tool (naft-gfe) can handle files (RAM dumps) that are too large to fit into memory.

Use option -b for buffered reads. By default, the file will be read and analyzed in blocks of 101MB (100MB buffer + 1MB overlap buffer).

Since the file is not read completely in memory, there is a possibility that some frames/packets are not completely read in memory. For example, a frame starts in the first block of 100MB, and ends in the second block of 100MB. The analysis routines would miss this frame.

To avoid this, the program reads the first block of 100MB (block A) plus an extra block of 1MB (block B). This block of 101MB (A + B) is analyzed. Then, the second block of 100MB (block C) is read, and the extra block B is prepended to block C for analysis (B + C). Hence the overlap buffer is analyzed twice, but packets are only extracted once from this buffer. This procedure is repeated for the complete file.

It is important that the overlap buffer is large enough to accommodate the largest possible frame or packet. That’s why by default, it is 1MB.

Use options -S and -O to choose your own size for buffer and overlap buffer.