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lifting-bits
mcsema
C++2014–2025
lifting-bits / mcsema · Archived

mcsema

Framework for lifting x86, amd64, aarch64, sparc32, and sparc64 program binaries to LLVM bitcode

Languages & Compilers
Explore on GitHubRead Hacker News discussions
18Distinct people
25Mentions
0Explicit recommenders
2.8KGitHub stars
REPOSITORY AT A GLANCE

What to know before exploring

What it is

Framework for lifting x86, amd64, aarch64, sparc32, and sparc64 program binaries to LLVM bitcode

GitHub

Where it is used

No documented product use was verified in the last source check.

What people are saying

No recommendation phrase was found in the indexed comments.

No classified warning is attached to this page. Read the discussions before treating silence as approval.

Also in these discussions

Mentioned in the same Hacker News threads. That is not proof they are substitutes.

This week on Hacker News

Nov 8–Nov 15 UTC · Direct repository links and separately labeled related project stories. Indexed through 11/15/2026, 1:57:11 AM UTC.

No direct repository links were found in the indexed HN discussions over the past seven days. Older discussions are available below.

Mentions over time

HN mentions by year25 dated mentions

Observed mentions: 2014-08-11 19:25:13 UTC to 2025-01-04 22:22:33 UTC.

02462014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 3 mentions; 0 submissions, 3 comments20142015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 2 mentions; 0 submissions, 2 comments2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 7 mentions; 0 submissions, 7 comments2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 6 mentions; 1 submissions, 5 comments20192020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 3 mentions; 1 submissions, 2 comments2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 1 submissions, 0 comments2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2026-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2025

Counts come from the repository’s dated source evidence. Index cutoff: 2026-11-02 08:16:59 UTC.

View mention counts and date ranges
UTC ranges include their start and exclude their end. Select a period to filter the source evidence.
PeriodStart (UTC)End (exclusive, UTC)MentionsSubmissionsComments
20142014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC303
20152015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
20162016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC202
20172017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101
20182018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC707
20192019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC615
20202020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC312
20212021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
20222022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101
20232023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
20242024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC110
20252025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2026-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101

What Hacker News says

2 sources
sjtgraham·Sep 17, 2016
Some thoughts on a X86 -> ARM migration: - Most 3rd party Apple development is already happening on ARM. This would inject new life into the desktop/laptop product line. Think of the thousands of apps that could now run on those platforms. - Apple gets rid of a massive chunk of BOM cost improving margins, i.e. Intel CPU. - No need to emulate X86 if Apple can do binary translation instead. There are already OSS projects like MC-Semantics (https://github.com/trailofbits/mcsema) that can take an X86 binary and emit LLVM IR. In theory you could give that to the ARM LLVM backend and relink to ARM frameworks. This would be an interesting problem to solve vis-a-vis code signing. One way would be for Apple to sign a code signing identity for each user, have the OS translate the binary, prompt the user for a password to get the private key from th
Read the rest
e keychain, sign the new executable, save it, and then run it. - I actually wonder how many desktop apps are commonly used on the macOS platform, and how big of a problem in 2016 an arch switch would be. Muggles are already predominantly using mobile devices. I'm guessing 99% of users use one of 100 (or less) desktop apps. I imagine it to be quite the long-tail.
In The iPhone's new chip should worry Intel
jbaviat·May 9, 2016
It depends on what you are looking to achieve. If you take a look to e.g. McSema https://github.com/trailofbits/mcsema, these guys have been able to use LLVM to transform assembly back to LLVM intermediate representation (IR). The IR is an abstract language used by LLVM during compilation to optimize the generated code. Being abstract basically allows to use optimizers across all LLVM supported architectures. In these terms, I think LLVM has a clear advantage over competitors. The following blog post give a nice overview of the McSema achievements: http://blog.trailofbits.com/2014/06/23/a-preview-of-mcsema/
In Panopticon: A libre, cross platform disassembler for reverse engineering

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