Cycript – Objective-C++/JavaScript hybrid debug REPL for OSX/iOS | Hacker News Reader

Cycript – Objective-C++/JavaScript hybrid debug REPL for OSX/iOS

cycript.org

33 pointssaurik15 comments

Thank you so much for sharing this, for making it open source, and even more so for documenting it so well!

I've used F-Script (on the Mac) whenever I needed something like this. However, the Smalltalk syntax seems to limit its appeal, and I've wondered whether a similar tool leveraging JavaScript could really take off. What you have created is far more sophisticated than I ever imagined. Looking forward to digging into it more.

For those like me who find the Smalltalk syntax appealing, there's hope to make more of it (given Objective-C's roots, this makes every sense): http://objective.st/

That looks really cool, but maybe a little ambitious? I don't know what Apple's restrictions are for iOS apps these days, but last time I was in the iOS game, they didn't allow anything that wasn't written directly in ObjC or C.

That's not the case anymore (ever?). There are iOS apps written in C#, Ruby, C++, and of course JS/HTML care of Phonegap.

I think the only real opposition to alternative stacks Apple publicly displayed was to Flash.

Edit: Actually it looks like Adobe Air also works: http://www.adobe.com/devnet/air/articles/air-on-ios-faq.html...

That was just a guideline, that was taken back before it was even enforced -- and that was 2-3 years ago.

I've been using cycript for a while now for reverse engineering iOS applications, and it's absolute witchcraft! You can tab-complete your way through objects, call arbitrary functions, -- it's a fantastic tool for any pen-testers doing work in the mobile space.

It's nice to see this project get some much needed love, I tried to compile it from source a while back and it was a nightmare.

I highly recommend reading the new manual: I have added tons of new features in the last few weeks. Example: you can now query live objects given a Class (I scavenge the heap looking for live memory ranges that are the right size and shape for that Class, or any subclass).

> I pronounce "cycript" using a "geminate S" or "long S". The result sounds a little like a stereotypical serpent from a cartoon: "sssscript". I doubt anyone else will pronounce it like this, but I have my hopes.

I can relate. Okay, I'll pronounce it that way! :)

Wow, this looks awesome.

> [x+1 for (x of @[1,2,3])]

I wasn't aware Objective-C++ or JavaScript supported list comprehensions like that.

This is a feature from "JavaScript 1.7" (the versions after 1.5 are Firefox-only). There is a similar feature in ECMAScript 6, but the syntax is slightly different. I support both the Firefox-specific syntax and the current ECMAScript draft. (But yeah, if you try that expression without the Objective-C @ symbol in Firefox, it will actually work.)

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Guid...

Great job! thank you saurik for all the effort and help. I'm having a small problem when attaching with the new version when on iPhone5 iOS7

(gdb) r Starting program: /usr/bin/cycript Reading symbols for shared libraries + done Reading symbols for shared libraries ++++................................................. done cy# Program received signal EXC_BAD_ACCESS, Could not access memory. Reason: KERN_INVALID_ADDRESS at address: 0x00000010 0x000127bc in CYDisplayMove () (gdb) where #0 0x000127bc in CYDisplayMove () #1 0x00012b50 in CYDisplayUpdate () #2 0x0015c9ae in readline_internal_setup () #3 0x0015d16e in readline () #4 0x0000b2fc in Main () #5 0x0000e668 in main ()

Can anyone share similar things for other environments/languages/OSes? Would love to play with something similar but I'm not on OSX/iOS.

Deleted comment

It's open source: http://svn.saurik.com/repos/cycript/trunk/

That code is old. http://gitweb.saurik.com/cycript.git. (This link is on the website in the menu at the bottom.) (I should probably put a "code now in git" notice on that Subversion repository, like I had done for most of my other projects.)

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