Two MEDIUM milestones bundled (both opportunistic per plan; both small).
## M5 — indirect-dispatch reachability
- `xenia_analysis::indirect`: per-basic-block register tracker over each
detected function. Recognises the canonical static-vtable pattern
`lis+addi → lwz off(rA) → mtctr → bcctrl` where rA holds a known M3
vtable address. Emits one `Xref { kind: IndirectCall }` per resolvable
bcctrl site.
- PowerPC ABI awareness: `bl`-style calls clobber volatile r0..r12 + ctr
but preserve non-volatile r13..r31, so a vtable pointer parked in r30/r31
before a call survives.
- Label-based basic-block boundaries kill register state — bounds
false-positive risk for jump-IN paths.
- New `XrefKind::IndirectCall` variant (DB tag `'ind_call'`).
- New SQL view `v_indirect_reachability_from_entry` — strict superset of
`v_reachability_from_entry`, taking `ind_call` edges in the BFS.
Sylpheed yield: 0 edges detected. The binary's 1,001 static lis+addi
references into vtables are nearly all constructor-side vptr writes, not
dispatches; real method dispatch goes through `this->vptr` which requires
alias analysis we explicitly don't do. Documented in SCHEMA.md as the
expected limitation. Three unit tests cover the synthetic-correctness path.
## M7 — string / constant-pool detection
- `xenia_analysis::strings`: scans `.rdata` for runs of ≥ 6 printable
ASCII bytes (NUL-terminated) and ≥ 6 UTF-16LE code units (basic-plane
printable ASCII, NUL u16 terminator).
- New `strings(address PK, encoding, length, content)` table + encoding index.
- Implicit cross-ref via existing `xrefs.kind='ref'` rows whose target
matches a strings.address.
Sylpheed yield: 6,311 ASCII strings (including embedded HLSL shader source
and AS_CB_SURFACE_SWIZZLE_* assertion strings). 9,132 lis+addi sites
cross-reference detected strings — names source PCs near each string in
one query. Four unit tests cover encoding detection, NUL termination, and
short-run rejection.
Tests 626→633 (+3 indirect, +4 strings).
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.7 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
11 KiB
xenia-analysis schema reference
Authoritative documentation for the DuckDB tables and SQL views produced by
xenia-rs dis --db sylpheed.db. Track schema changes here alongside any
update to the db_schema_golden test fixture.
The base + disasm tables (metadata, sections, imports, functions,
labels, instructions, xrefs, opt-in exec_trace / import_calls /
branch_trace) are documented inline in src/db.rs doc comment. This file
collects layered analysis additions and forward-work notes.
Layer M1 — .pdata boundary correction (landed)
Schema additions
functions.pdata_validated BOOLEAN NOT NULL—truewhen the row'saddressmatches aRUNTIME_FUNCTION.BeginAddressfrom.pdata. Linker ground truth.functions.pdata_length BIGINT NULL—function_length(bytes) from the matching pdata entry;NULLwhen the row is prologue-only.- New table
pdata_entries(begin_address BIGINT PRIMARY KEY, end_address BIGINT, function_length BIGINT, prolog_length BIGINT, flags BIGINT)— every parsed.pdataRUNTIME_FUNCTIONentry (raw, before any merge with prologue analysis). - Index
idx_functions_pdata_validatedonfunctions(pdata_validated).
What this layer does
- Parses
.pdata8-byteRUNTIME_FUNCTIONentries (PowerPC PE32 layout): word 0BeginAddress(absolute VA), word 1 packed{prolog_length:8, function_length:22, flags:2}, both big-endian. - Unions pdata
BeginAddressvalues into the function-candidate set fed to the prologue walker, so functions our prologue heuristic missed still get rows. - When pdata supplies a longer
function_lengththan the prologue walk found, extendsend_addressto the pdata-implied end (catches mis-split where the walker stopped at an earlyblr). - After the walker, performs a forward pass that trims
function.endto the next start when they overlap (catches mis-merge where one row spanned two prologues — the audit-031sub_824D23B0/sub_824D29F0case).
What this layer does NOT do
- Does not adjust prolog-derived
frame_size/saved_gprsfrom.pdata'sprolog_lengthfield — those remain prologue-only inferences. - Does not classify functions further than the existing
is_leaf/is_saverestorecolumns. Class membership is M3. - Does not detect functions whose entries are missing from BOTH
.pdataand the bl-target scan (extremely rare; would require executable-byte linear sweep).
Reference docs
- Microsoft PE32+ exception data spec for PowerPC RUNTIME_FUNCTION.
- xenia-canary
src/xenia/cpu/xex_module.cc:1570-1587— canary's reference parser (extractsBeginAddressonly; we additionally decode word 1).
Validation queries
-- All pdata entries found
SELECT COUNT(*) FROM pdata_entries; -- ~23073 for Sylpheed
-- Functions cross-validated against pdata
SELECT COUNT(*) FROM functions WHERE pdata_validated;
-- Functions detected ONLY by prologue (orphans of pdata)
SELECT COUNT(*) FROM functions WHERE NOT pdata_validated;
-- Pdata orphans NOT yet in functions (should be 0 after this layer)
SELECT COUNT(*) FROM pdata_entries p
LEFT JOIN functions f ON f.address = p.begin_address
WHERE f.address IS NULL;
-- Audit-031 mis-merge resolved: 0x824D29F0 should have its own row
SELECT name FROM functions WHERE address = 2186674160; -- 0x824D29F0
Layer M2 — MSVC C++ name demangler (landed)
Schema additions
- New table
demangled_names(address BIGINT NULL, mangled VARCHAR NOT NULL, raw_demangled VARCHAR NOT NULL, namespace_path VARCHAR NULL, class_name VARCHAR NULL, method_name VARCHAR NULL, params_signature VARCHAR NULL). - Indices on
address,class_name,method_name.
What this layer does
- Wraps
msvc_demangler::demangle(a Rust port of LLVM'sMicrosoftDemangle.cpp) and splits the formatted output into structured fields via a heuristic top-level parser (handles templates and nested parens correctly). - Populates
demangled_namesfrom any label whose name starts with?plus any import name that happens to be mangled (defensive — typical kernel imports use C names).
What this layer does NOT do
- Does not parse the AST returned by
msvc_demangler::parse— uses the formatted string and a heuristic split. Adequate for typical class member functions and RTTI strings; exotic template / lambda forms still getraw_demangledpopulated but may have NULL structured fields. - Does not yet ingest RTTI strings discovered in
.rdata— that's M3's job; M3 will append rows to this table at the addresses where it finds RTTI TypeDescriptors.
Reference docs
msvc-demanglercrate (https://docs.rs/msvc-demangler/0.11).- LLVM
MicrosoftDemangle.cpp(the parser this crate ports).
Layer M3 — Vtable + RTTI detection (landed)
Schema additions
vtables(address PK, length, col_address NULL, class_name, rtti_present, base_classes_json NULL)— every detected static vtable.methods(vtable_address, slot, function_address, mangled_name NULL, demangled_name NULL, PRIMARY KEY (vtable_address, slot))— one row per method slot.classes(name PK, vtable_address, rtti_present, base_classes_json NULL)— deduped by class name (first-detected vtable wins).- Indices:
methods.function_address,classes.rtti_present.
What this layer does
- Walks
.rdataand.datalooking for runs of ≥3 consecutive 4-byte BE values where each value is a known function start (from M1's correctedfunctionstable). Single-2-method vtables are intentionally rejected to control false-positive rate. - Attempts the MSVC RTTI walk
vtable[-1] → CompleteObjectLocator → TypeDescriptorfor each candidate. When successful, the demangledclass ClassNamestring fillsclass_nameand a best-effortRTTIClassHierarchyDescriptorwalk fillsbase_classes_json(JSON array of base class names). - Falls back to
ANON_Class_<8-hex>keyed by FNV-1a hash of the sorted method-PC tuple when RTTI is absent (typical for shipped game binaries). Identical vtables across the binary (multiple instances) collapse to the same anonymous name.
What this layer does NOT do
- Vtables built at runtime in heap-allocated memory (e.g. by ctors copying
static templates) are out of scope — only static
.rdata/.datacontent. - Multiple-inheritance "extra" vftables (one per base subobject) are detected as independent vtables with no link between them.
- Inheritance-tree walking beyond
RTTIClassHierarchyDescriptor's direct base list is not attempted.
Reference docs
- openrce.org "Reversing Microsoft Visual C++" — RTTI layout articles (CompleteObjectLocator at vtable[-1]; TypeDescriptor at COL+0xC; mangled name at TD+0x8).
Layer M4 — Class-aware probe targeting (landed)
CLI extension only — no schema changes. The probe-token grammar adds three
symbolic forms on top of the existing 0xADDR literal:
Class::method— joinsclasses×methods×demangled_namesto find every PC whose vtable belongs to that class and whose demangledmethod_namematches.Class::*— joinsclasses×methodsto find every method PC of that class.function_name— falls back tofunctions.namelookup for free functions / saverestore stubs / labels.
Numeric tokens never touch the DB (preserves zero-IO fast path; lockstep
digest unaffected). Symbolic tokens require the DuckDB at --probe-db PATH
or XENIA_PROBE_DB; default is sylpheed.db next to the .iso when present.
Resolution happens BEFORE guest exec begins, so it cannot affect the lockstep digest.
See crates/xenia-analysis/src/lookup.rs.
Layer M5 — Indirect-dispatch reachability (landed)
Schema additions
- New value
'ind_call'in thexrefs.kindset. - New SQL view
v_indirect_reachability_from_entry— strict superset ofv_reachability_from_entry, takingind_calledges in the BFS.
What this layer does
- Walks each
FuncAnalysis.functionsentry with a per-basic-block register tracker. Recognises the canonical static-vtable pattern:lis+addi → lwz off(rA) → mtctr → bcctrl, whererAends up holding a known vtable's start address from M3. - Honours the PowerPC ABI:
bl-style calls (op 18 / 16 with LK=1) clobber volatile r0..r12 + ctr but preserve non-volatile r13..r31, so a vtable pointer parked in r30/r31 before a call survives. - Treats every M3
loc_*label as a basic-block boundary (kills register state) so jump-IN paths cannot induce false positives.
What this layer does NOT do (and observed impact)
- Vtable pointer loaded from a
this-pointer field (lwz r_vt, off(rA)whererA = this) — by far the dominant pattern in real C++ — is unresolvable without alias / points-to analysis. - On Sylpheed: the layer detects 0 edges. The binary's 1,001 lis+addi
references into vtables are mostly constructor-side vptr writes
(
stw rVtable, vptr_offset(this)), not direct dispatches. The renderer hunt's audit-009 cluster therefore needs a future M5.5 withthis-flow tracking before this layer surfaces it.
Reference docs
- IBM PowerPC ABI: register-save convention (volatile r0..r12 + ctr, non-volatile r13..r31).
Layer M7 — String / constant-pool detection (landed)
Schema additions
- New table
strings(address PK, encoding, length, content). - Index
idx_strings_encoding.
What this layer does
- Scans
.rdatafor runs of length ≥ 6 of printable ASCII bytes followed by a NUL terminator. - Scans
.rdatafor UTF-16LE runs of length ≥ 6 code units (printable-ASCII basic plane only) followed by a u16 NUL terminator. - Cross-reference is implicit: existing
xrefs.kind='ref'rows whosetargetfalls instrings.address's exact match set name the referencing PCs. SQL:SELECT s.content, x.source FROM xrefs x JOIN strings s ON s.address = x.target WHERE x.kind='ref'.
What this layer does NOT do
- No UTF-8 multibyte / non-ASCII basic plane in either encoding.
- No
.datascan (read-only-section bias). - No multi-byte CJK encodings — Japanese text in localised builds may be represented in shift_jis / utf-8 with non-printable bytes that this scanner skips.
Sylpheed yield
- 6,311 ASCII strings (including full embedded HLSL shader source).
- 0 UTF-16LE strings (binary uses ASCII / native CJK encoding).
- 9,132 lis+addi sites cross-reference into the detected strings — names the source PCs that reference each string.
Forward work (M6, M8–M12, not yet landed)
- M6 — extended
xrefs.kind='write'for indexed/byte-reverse/multiword/VMX/DCBZ/atomic stores withaddr_modecolumn. - M8 — dispatch-table heuristics beyond vtables (e.g. function-pointer arrays in
.data). - M9 —
__CxxFrameHandlerexception scope-table parsing. - M10 —
.tlssection / TLS slot tracking. - M11 —
__xc_a/__xc_zstatic-initializer driver detection. - M12 — comparative-PC-trace mode for canary diff (runtime side, not analyzer).