Working with Files

Working with files

This part introduce the most common, day-to-day operations you will want to perform on your files/idbs.

Adding files to the vault

1. From the "Local files" widget, you can add a file that is not yet present in the Hex-Rays Vault server. From the context menu, click "Add to vault".

2. That file will now be added to the current worklist (one will be created if needed):

3. To make this new file available to all users, the worklist must be committed by using "Commit..."

4. Once the worklist is committed, it becomes a commit, and the modifications are then available for everyone and visible in the Commits widget:

TIP: Notice how our commit isn’t the first one in the system: another user submitted a commit before us.

Modifying files

When working on a file, a user must first check it out for modification.

1. Right-click the file and select Checkout for Edit from the context menu.

Just like with the adding, the file will now show in a worklists, and just like with the adding, whatever modification you make to the file, will only be visible to coworkers after committing that worklist.

Committing

Files that have been checked out (e.g. for modification) or opened for adding will go into a worklist until they are committed, which then turns the worklist into a commit.

1. A worklist can be committed to make its changes available to other users: right-click, commit

2. The worklist becomes a commit, ​and the worklist is gone

Synchronizing files

To fetch the latest set of the changes (changes/additions/deletions), use "Get latest revision".

Viewing the history of a file

To get an overview of all of the changes made to a file: right-click, File history

From the "History of …​" widget, you can view any revision of a file.

It’s also possible to synchronize files to older revisions, from this widget.

When asked to do that, IDA will retrieve that older revision of the file from the server. This is what will now be present on your filesystem.

Notice how the file now shows as 'outdated':

Opening files

On many widgets, it's possible to view/open a file. If the file extension has a corresponding association it will be used to open the file.

File associations

Out-of-the-box, .i64 files are associated with IDA. In addition to that, it provides a default "fallback" "*" association that will cause matching files to be opened in IDA.

Users can specify their file extension associations via Teams → Options dialog.

File extension associations

Deleting files

Files can be removed from the server (if they have become unnecessary for example): right-click, Checkout for delete.

Just like other file actions, the change (deletion) needs to be committed for its effects to be visible on the server.

Reverting changes to files

To revert unwanted changes to a file: right-click, Revert

It is also possible to use "Revert if unchanged" to only revert files that were checked out without actual changes. This is especially useful when used on a selection of files or a directory.

Renaming and Moving Files or Folders

One may wish to rename and/or move around files/folders in their workspace, for that "Checkout for move/rename..." can be used.

Copying Files or Folders

IDA with Teams provides an action to copy files or directories easily. Use "Checkout for copy...".

Finding a file in the vault

When a vault contains a lot of files, manually searching for a file in the directory tree becomes inefficient. To help you locate files easily, you can use the Find in vault…​ action.

You can navigate between the search results by using Next search result and Previous search result, located next to Find in vault…​.

Font styles

As you may have noticed by now, files are shown with different font styles in different circumstances.

A gray font denotes a file that is not in the vault. It has been added or renamed and not yet commited.

A bold font means that this file is being worked on, or has been changed.

An italic font means that it’s not the latest version of this file.

Some combinations are possible, for example a file being resolved (not latest version and being worked on) will have a bold and italic font style. The combination gray (not in vault) and italic (not latest version) is for example not possible.