Using LibAFL in no_std environments

It is possible to use LibAFL in no_std environments e.g. on custom platforms like microcontrollers, kernels, hypervisors, and more.

You can simply add LibAFL to your Cargo.toml file:

libafl = { path = "path/to/libafl/", default-features = false}

Then build your project e.g. for aarch64-unknown-none using:

cargo build --no-default-features --target aarch64-unknown-none

Use custom timing

The minimum amount of support LibAFL needs for a no_std environment is a monotonically increasing timestamp. For this, anywhere in your project you need to implement the external_current_millis function, which returns the current time in milliseconds.

// Assume this a clock source from a custom stdlib, which you want to use, which returns current time in seconds.
int my_real_seconds(void)
{
    return *CLOCK;
}

Here, we use it in Rust. external_current_millis is then called from LibAFL. Note that it needs to be no_mangle in order to get picked up by LibAFL at linktime:

#[no_mangle]
pub extern "C" fn external_current_millis() -> u64 {
    unsafe { my_real_seconds()*1000 }
}

See ./fuzzers/baby_no_std for an example.