HexViewerPlus

HexViewerPlus - a custom editor extension for Visual Studio Code that provides a hex viewer/editor for viewing and manipulating files in their raw hexadecimal representation, with advanced format support (SREC, IntelHex, TI-TXT, ELF). This software is designed by 公众号：嵌入式软件实战派.

Features

Two Custom Editors

Supported Formats (Auto-Detected)

Copy As — 9 Output Formats

Select bytes → right-click (or Alt+Ctrl+C) → choose format:

File Comparison & Report

• Compare any two files (even mixed formats, e.g. .hex vs .elf)
• Byte-by-byte diff with red-highlighted differences
• Smart collapse: identical regions ≥256 bytes, gaps ≥64 bytes auto-folded
• Export comprehensive HTML report with summary stats and row-by-row table

Advanced Navigation

Data Inspector

Real-time decoded value of selected bytes, supporting:

• Integer types: Int8 / Int16 / Int32 / Int64 / Uint8 / Uint16 / Uint32 / Uint64
• Floating point: Float / Double
• Configurable endianness (Little / Big)
• Three display modes: Aside (next to grid), Hover (on mouseover), Sidebar (dedicated panel)

Search

• Literal search: Find byte sequences (supports wildcard * for any byte)
• Regex search: Regular expression matching on ASCII interpretation
• Streaming results with real-time progress feedback
• Case-sensitive option

Edit Features

• Direct byte value editing in the grid
• Full undo / redo history
• Automatic backup (VSCode Hot Exit compatible)
• Disk change detection — prompts when external programs modify the file

Commands

Configuration

How to Use

There are several ways to open files with HexViewerPlus:

Method 1: From Explorer (Recommended)

1. Right-click any file in the VSCode Explorer
2. Choose "Open File in HexFormatView" (read-only) or "Open File in HexEditor" (read-write)

Method 2: Command Palette

1. Press F1 or Ctrl+Shift+P
2. Run "HexViewerPlus: Open File in HexEditor" or "HexViewerPlus: Open File in HexFormatView"

Method 3: Reopen With

1. Open a file with any other extension first
2. Press F1 → "Reopen With..." → select HexViewerPlus

Set as Default Editor

Associate specific file extensions with HexViewerPlus via workbench.editorAssociations:

"workbench.editorAssociations": {
    "*.hex": "hexViewerPlus.hexEdit",
    "*.s19": "hexViewerPlus.hexEdit",
    "*.bin": "hexViewerPlus.hexEdit",
    "*.elf": "hexViewerPlus.hexEdit"
}

Comparing Two Files

1. In HexFormatView, double-click two files in the Explorer to select them both
2. Right-click → "Compare Selected in HexFormatView"
3. Review the side-by-side diff, then "Export Compare Report (HTML)" for a shareable report

License Activation

HexViewerPlus uses machine-bound license keys for large file access (>1 MB).

Activation Flow

1. Run command "Get Activation Code" — your unique Machine ID and activation code are copied to clipboard
2. Send the activation code to your license provider(GET LICENSE)
3. Receive back an HexVP-XXXXXXXX license key
4. Run "Enter License Key" → paste the key → validate

The license is stored locally at ~/.hexviewerplus/license.json and automatically loaded on subsequent startups. The license is bound to your machine fingerprint (Windows: MachineGuid, macOS: IOPlatformUUID, Linux: /etc/machine-id).

Performance

HexViewerPlus is engineered for extremely large firmware files. Key optimizations:

• O(n) segment merging (vs. O(n²) incremental): 152K segments merged to 2 in ~72ms (was ~118s)
• Segment-driven virtual scroll: iterates only over data segments, skipping 90%+ gap areas
• Batch base64 encoding: single allocation + encode instead of 152K small chunk encodes
• Binary search for byteAt: O(log n) lookup vs. O(n) linear scan

Benchmark: Appl.hex — 152,652 lines, 4.8 MB source, 11.2 MB address span, ~43% data density.

Known Issues

To track existing issues or report a new one, please visit the issue tracker.

Third-Party Licenses

This extension includes code derived from the following open-source project:

vscode-hexeditor

• Source: https://github.com/microsoft/vscode-hexeditor
• Copyright: Copyright (c) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
• License: MIT License

The full copyright notice and license text are reproduced below.

MIT License

Copyright (c) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.

This extension itself is proprietary software. Its license terms are available in the LICENSE.md file included in the extension package.