Installation Guide
Welcome to the installation guide for Mobius Forensic Toolkit! In this guide, we will walk you through the process of setting up and installing Mobius Forensic Toolkit.
The package names mentioned in this guide are specific to OpenSUSE Leap 15.3. If you are using a different Linux distribution, the package names may differ. The commands provided in this guide are for installing version 1.35 of the software. If you are installing a different version, you will need to modify the commands accordingly.
There are two ways to install Mobius Forensic Toolkit: by building from source files, or by using the .AppImage bundle file. The steps for each method are provided in the following sections.
1. Installing MobiusFT from source code (.tar.xz and .zip)
In this section, we will walk you through the process of configuring and installing Mobius Forensic Toolkit on a system that uses the GNU toolchain.
The GNU toolchain is a collection of programming tools that are used to develop software for Linux and other Unix-like systems. It includes tools such as the GNU Compiler Collection (GCC), the GNU Debugger (GDB), and the GNU Make utility.
Mobius Forensic Toolkit has been designed to be built and installed using the GNU toolchain, so you will need to have these tools installed on your system before proceeding with the installation. If you do not already have the GNU toolchain installed, you can typically install it using your system's package manager.
Once you have the GNU toolchain set up, you can follow the steps in this section to build and install Mobius Forensic Toolkit. We'll start by downloading the source code for the tool and preparing the build process, then we'll walk you through the process of compiling and installing Mobius Forensic Toolkit on your system.
Let's get started!
To begin, use a package manager available on your Linux distribution to install both the required packages and optional packages listed below:
Required packages
- g++ (or any C++14 compatible compiler)
- Python 3 version 3.6 or newer
- python3-devel
- python3-cairo
- python3-gobject-devel
- python3-gobject-gdk
- python3-libxml2-python
- gtk3-devel
- libgtksourceview-4-0
- libsqlite3
- libtsk (from Sleuthkit package. See https://www.sleuthkit.org)
- libdl (already installed in most Linux distributions)
Optional packages
- libz (already installed in most Linux distributions)
- libudev (already installed in most Linux distributions)
- libsmbclient (from Samba/Samba client package)
Download the latest version of Mobius Forensic Toolkit using one of the links available in this page.This is typically provided as a tar archive, which can be extracted using the tar command. For example:
tar xvf mobiusft-1.35.tar.xz
Navigate to the directory containing the extracted source code, using the cd command:
cd mobiusft-1.35
Run the configure script to prepare the build process. This will check for dependencies and configure the build to match your system. The configure script is usually invoked using the following command:
./configure
You can install Mobius Forensic Toolkit to a specific directory, using the --prefix option. For example:
./configure --prefix=/opt/mobiusft-1.35
If you have installed the Sleuthkit package in a specific directory, use the --with-libtsk option. For example:
./configure --with-libtsk=/opt/sleuthkit-4.11.0
The configure script will run, trying to identify your system configuration and to find both the required packages and the optional packages. At the end, the script will show a summary like this one:
Python API...................: yes mobius::database.............: yes mobius::filesystem::tsk......: yes mobius::imagefile::ewf.......: yes mobius::io::smb..............: yes mobius::system::device.......: yes mobius::system::dynamic_lib..: yes mobius::zlib functions.......: yes
It is highly recommended that you install all the required packages and all the optional packages, for a better user experience.
Run the make command to build Mobius Forensic Toolkit. This will compile the source code and create the executable file:
make
If the build was successful, you can install Mobius Forensic Toolkit using the make install command. This will typically install the tool to a system directory such as /usr/local/bin:
sudo make install
2. Installing MobiusFT using .AppImage file
In this section, we will walk you through the process of installing Mobius Forensic Toolkit on your system using an AppImage file.
An AppImage is a portable application format that allows you to run applications on a variety of Linux distributions without the need to install them. It includes all of the necessary dependencies and libraries, so you can simply download and run the AppImage file to use the application.
To install and run our application using an AppImage file, you will need to have the AppImage runtime installed on your system. This is typically included by default on most modern Linux distributions, but if it is not installed you can typically install it using your system's package manager.
Once you have the AppImage runtime set up, you can follow the steps in this guide to download and install Mobius Forensic Toolkit using the AppImage file. We'll start by downloading the AppImage file and making it executable, then we'll show you how to run the application and (if desired) make it available system-wide.
Let's get started!
If your Linux distribution does not already include Python 3, you will need to install it before proceeding.
Download the latest AppImage file for the Mobius Forensic Toolkit, using the link available in this page. This is typically a single executable file with a .appimage extension.
Make the AppImage file executable. You can do this using the chmod command, like this:
chmod +x mobiusft-1.35-x86_64.AppImage
If you want to make the application available system-wide, copy the .AppImage to your favorite bin directory, such as the /usr/local/bin directory. This will allow you to run the application from any directory by simply typing its name on the command line.