4

The intel PIN manual (section Memory Reference Trace) says:

We also use INS_InsertPredicatedCall instead of INS_InsertCall to avoid generating references to instructions that are predicated when the predicate is false see here.

_

When the instruction has a predicate and the predicate is false, the analysis function is not called see here.

If I want to analyze all instructions that are actually executed, which of the two shall I pick?

I assume INS_InsertPredicatedCall but I am not sure because I have seen INS_InsertCall more often. But why would somebody use it, i.e., why would somebody want to analyze instructions

that are predicated when the predicate is false

? Maybe a minimal example of how the two functions lead to different results would be helpful here...

1 Answer 1

3

You are correct, we should use INS_InsertPredicatedCall instead of INS_InsertCall in your case. It is quite intuitive to distinguish one from the other, consider the following code

cond:
  xor eax, eax
  mov edx, 0x1
  cmp word [esp + 0x4], 0x5
  cmovz eax, edx
  ret

whose C code is something likes

int cond(int input)
{
  return input == 0x5 ? 1 : 0;
}

If you use INS_InsertCall to trace executed instructions of cond(input), then for any value of input, you observe always the trace:

xor eax, eax
mov edx, 0x1
cmp word [esp + 0x4], 0x5
cmovz eax, edx
ret

But if you use INS_InsertPredicateCall, then for input != 0x5, you will observe only:

xor eax, eax
mov edx, 0x1
cmp word [esp + 0x4], 0x5
ret

since cmovz is a predicated instruction, it is executed only if ZF = 1.

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