Introduction⌗

In this short post, we’re building a barebones,toy implementation of the ls-like directory listing program in x86-64 assembly. We achieve this by using the getdents syscall.

getdents() syscall⌗

The getdents syscall takes in 3 parameters. So the prototype of the syscall looks like: ssize_t getdents(int fd, void *dirp, size_t count), where:

1. fd : is the file descriptor of the directory (which is also just another file in Unix)
2. dirp : is where all the dirent structs are copied during the syscall.
3. count : is the size of the buffer that dirp points to.

Dirent structs⌗

A dirent or linux_dirent struct is defined as follows.

struct linux_dirent {
       unsigned long  d_ino;     /* File inode*/
       unsigned long  d_off;     /* Offset of the next linux_dirent */
       unsigned short d_reclen;  /* Size of the current dirent struct*/
       char           d_name[];  // The filename of the file

       char           pad;       // Zero padding byte
       char           d_type;    // File types such as block devices, named pipes, sockets etc.
   }

So anytime we call the getdents syscall, we are populating with dirent structures, the buffer that dirp points to. Notice how the struct also involves the filename of the file that the struct is for. We can use this for directory listing!

The program⌗

The program that we are building lists the directory contents of the current directory. We allocate a 512 bytes buffer for storing the dirent structs. (Which is sufficient for a toy implementation)

Based on the info above, we define the .bss and the .data sections as follows:

[SECTION .data]
dirname: db '.'

[SECTION .bss]
msgbuf:
	resb 512

Then in the .text section, we write the actual program, which consists of 2 functions called main and next_dirent. We populate the msgbuf in the main function and then process the dirent structs in the next_dirent function, which handles the buffer struct by struct.

The main function goes like:

[SECTION .text]
extern puts
global main

main:
	;Setup
	push rbp
	mov rbp, rsp
	and rsp, 0xfffffffffffffff0

	;Open the current directory using the open() syscall
	mov rax, 2
	mov rdi, dirname
	mov rsi, 0x10000
	syscall

	;getdents(fd, buf, 64) syscall
	mov rdi, rax  ;The open syscall returns the fd for the current directory
	mov rax,78
	mov rsi, msgbuf
	mov rdx, 512
	syscall
	xchg rax,rdx  ;Syscall returns total size, save it somewhere safe

	;setup registers for loop
	xor rcx, rcx
	xor rbx, rbx

Now that we have the structs we need in the msgbuf, we can iterate over them. Heading into the next_dirent function:

next_dirent:
	;We move to the 0th position of msgbuf every loop
	;and absolute position of every struct from it
	mov rax, msgbuf
	add rax, rcx		

	;Grab the length of current struct
	;i.e reclen with offset adjustments
	add rax, 0x10
	movzx bx, byte [rax]

	;puts modifies state of registers so save
	;them on the stack
	push rcx
	push rdx

	;Grab filename from its offset and print it
	;to stdout
	add rax, 0x2
	mov rdi, rax
	call puts

	;Restore register states
	pop rdx				
	pop rcx

	;Move to next struct if
	;index(curr_struct) < total structs
	add cx, bx			
	cmp cx, dx			
	jl next_dirent

	;Leave
	mov rsp, rbp
	pop rbp
	ret

Offset calculation is:

• The struct size sits at struct_index + 8*2 = 0x10 bytes. 2 unsigned longs are considered for.
• The filename sits at struct_index + 8*2 + 2 = 0x12bytes. 1 unsigned short is considered for. Note that we just add 0x2 to the struct size offset when outputting the filename.

Results⌗

>=> ls
file1.txt  file2.txt  main
>=> ./main
.
file2.txt
main
..
file1.txt

Thus we get a barebones directory listing.

The compile script and code is available : Here

P.S⌗

I originally intended to write some malware in assembly with this, but got sidetracked and this was made ;)