Trail of Bits Trailmark Structural Analysis
Builds a Trailmark graph and runs engine.preanalysis() to compute all
four pre-analysis passes.
When to Use
- Vivisect Phase 1 needs full structural data (hotspots, taint, blast radius, privilege boundaries)
- Detailed pre-analysis passes for a specific target scope
- Generating complexity and taint data for audit prioritization
When NOT to Use
- Quick overview only (use
trailmark-summaryinstead) - Ad-hoc code graph queries (use the main
trailmarkskill directly) - Target is a single small file where structural analysis adds no value
Rationalizations to Reject
| Rationalization | Why It's Wrong | Required Action |
|---|---|---|
| "Summary analysis is enough" | Summary skips taint, blast radius, and privilege boundary data | Run full structural analysis when detailed data is needed |
| "One pass is sufficient" | Passes cross-reference each other — taint without blast radius misses critical nodes | Run all four passes |
| "Tool isn't installed, I'll analyze manually" | Manual analysis misses what tooling catches | Report "trailmark is not installed" and return |
| "Empty pass output means the pass failed" | Some passes produce no data for some codebases (e.g., no privilege boundaries) | Return full output regardless |
Usage
The target directory is passed via the args parameter.
Execution
Step 1: Check that trailmark is available.
trailmark analyze --help 2>/dev/null || \
uv run trailmark analyze --help 2>/dev/null
If neither command works, report "trailmark is not installed"
and return. Do NOT run pip install, uv pip install,
git clone, or any install command. The user must install
trailmark themselves.
Step 2: Detect languages with Trailmark's parse API.
python3 - "{args}" <<'PY'
import json
import sys
from trailmark.parse import detect_languages
print(json.dumps(detect_languages(sys.argv[1])))
PY
If the import fails, rerun the same snippet with uv run python - "{args}".
If the result is [], report "Trailmark found no supported languages under
target" and return.
Step 3: Run the full structural analysis via QueryEngine.
Run this snippet with python3. If the import fails, rerun the same snippet
under uv run python - "{args}".
python3 - "{args}" <<'PY'
import json
import sys
from trailmark.parse import detect_languages
from trailmark.query.api import QueryEngine
target = sys.argv[1]
languages = detect_languages(target)
engine = QueryEngine.from_directory(target, language="auto")
preanalysis = engine.preanalysis()
def summarize_subgraph(name: str, limit: int = 25) -> dict[str, object]:
nodes = engine.subgraph(name)
return {
"count": len(nodes),
"sample_ids": [node["id"] for node in nodes[:limit]],
}
payload = {
"languages": languages,
"summary": engine.summary(),
"preanalysis": preanalysis,
"attack_surface": engine.attack_surface()[:25],
"hotspots": engine.complexity_hotspots(10)[:25],
"subgraphs": {
name: summarize_subgraph(name)
for name in engine.subgraph_names()
},
}
print(json.dumps(payload, indent=2))
PY
Step 4: Verify the output.
The output should include:
languagessummarypreanalysishotspots(possibly empty)subgraphswith counts and sample IDs
Some subgraphs may have zero nodes for some codebases (this is normal). Return the full JSON payload regardless.